The DC Defenders
by Dreadman75
Summary: In the year 2277, Vault 101 opened its doors, and two vault dwellers were forced out into the hellish Capital Wasteland. How will they leave their mark on the world? Will they fall prey to its dangers, or rise above them and become its saviors?
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I do not in any way own any part of the Fallout series or anything else associated with it.

A/N: Hello, for those of you who don't know me, my name is Dreadman75. I'm a relatively new author to the site and a big fan of Fallout 3 (having bought it and beaten it fairly recently), and have been wondering "How would the Lone Wanderer's adventure have turned out if Amata had left Vault 101 with him in the beginning?" Well this is what I believe would have happened.

(If you see anything that is wrong or needs correcting, please tell me so, after all a noob like me can't be expected to know or remember everything that was said, or exactly what items went where)

"Talking"

_'Thinking'_

***sound effects***

Ch.1 Escape!

Angelos' POV

"Wake up, you've got to wake up Angelos." The voice pierced through the veil of sleep, quickly waking the sleeping 19-year old known as Angelos.

"Uh, huh, wh-what is it Amata" I say, still trying to fully comprehend what was going on in my sleep addled state.

"You've got to go, hurry" Shouted Amata, still frantic, sounding like she had recently seen something that had frightened her beyond rational thought.

"Whoa, whoa." I say, still trying to make sense of the situation. _'Okay, lets see, my best friend down here in this hole is currently in my room, yelling at me hysterically. I can hear alarms and the Overseers voice over the PA system saying that all residents are to remain in their rooms, and I __**think **__I can hear the distinctive voice of officer Kendall yelling that radroaches are everywhere.' _"What the hell is going on Amata? For gods sake you look like you've seen a ghost!"

"It's your father...he's gone!"

That was perhaps the last thing I was expecting. "Gone? What do you mean Gone?!" I said failing to understand what she had just told me.

"I mean that he's left the vault. He just opened the door and vanished.," She said.

"But that's impossible, no one leaves the vault.," I said remembering the words of the Overseer himself.

"Apparently not...but are you telling me that you had no idea what your father was planning?," she said confused."

"No, I had no idea he was planning something like this." I said still not believing it myself.

"Oh, I'm sorry...but we can't waste anymore time here, you have to run before my fathers men find you!" she said almost hysterically.

"Hold on, why should I run. I mean I could just explain everything to your father and that'll be that right?" I said hopefully

"You don't understand! They killed Jonas because they believed he helped your father escape!," she blurted out.

"They...killed Jonas," I said, almost choking on my words.

Amata looked down, she was obviously saddened she had to tell me this way. "Yes, right after your father left, they found him and...and...," she looked as though she would break down any second. She recovered and said "I'm sorry, I know Jonas was your friend."

"Yeah," I said, not really listening as the weight of the situation finally dawned on me. _'I have to escape somehow, if they find me...no I can't think about that now. Right now I need a plan,' _I thought to myself, then I said "I need to get out of the Vault too, Amata. I need to find my dad and see what made him leave in the first place."

"Your in luck, I already have a plan to get you out of here." she replied, "You have to get to my father's office. In there is a secret tunnel leading straight to the Vault door... here use these," she said holding out 10 bobby pins in her hand, "It's how I always get in." she explained when she saw the disbelieving look on my face.

I reached out for the pins when a thought occurred to me, "Wait," I said, "If you and your father know about this tunnel then what makes you think it won't be guarded in some way?," I questioned.

"We don't have time for this!," she said forcefully, thrusting the bobby pins into my hand, "Look you just have to trust me, no one else knows about the tunnel. Oh, and take this too, you may need it" she added while holding out a 10mm pistol and ammo out towards me.

I look at the pistol for a moment before responding, "No, you take it you'll probably need it more than me."

She looked like she was about to argue but thought better of it. "Well...I guess it'll come in handy if I run into any radroaches. But what are you going to defend yourself with?" she asked.

"Don't worry about me," I said, walking to the nearby table, picking up my BB gun, 50 pellets, and a baseball bat. "After all I was the designated hitter on the Vault 101 baseball team." I replied, smiling at her, and giving the bat a couple of test swings. "You better get going, after all it won't look good for you to be caught talking to me right now, be careful."

"Alright, you be careful yourself. A large amount of radroaches found their way inside somehow and security is out in force trying control the situation. I'll try to meet you at the exit." she said running out the door and into the hall before disappearing from my sight.

I walk over to the first aid box on the wall of my room grabbing 10 stimpaks, and a Med-x hypo, before rummaging through my chest of drawers and pulling out 3 Vault 101 jumpsuits. _'Might as well take everything I can who knows what will come in handy outside this place,'_ I think to myself before running out into the hall.

3rd person POV

"THERE HE IS! HOLD IT RIGHT THERE!" The sudden shout caused Angelos to turn to his right where he saw officer Kendall coming towards him, getting ready to start swinging his baton, when all of sudden three radroaches came out of nowhere and began biting at him. _'I'll let him deal with the roaches then I'll deal with him,' _Angelos thought as he heard him yell "CRIMINEY, MORE ROACHES!" He hung back near the door to his apartment and waited, once officer Kendall was done with the roaches Angelos ran up to him and delivered two high powered hits to Kendall's head, knocking him to the floor where he didn't get up.

_'Did I kill him?' _thought Angelos as he crouched down to check Kendall's pulse, relieved when he found that the officer was only unconscious. _'That's good. I really don't need any deaths on my conscience. I bet that security armor he's wearing would be much more effective than this crummy jumpsuit though, and his baton would make a nice one handed weapon.'_ he thought. As he he took the armor, and police baton from the unconscious Kendall and put it on, surprised to find it fit pretty well. _'Huh, one size fits all I suppose'._ He turned his attention to the dead radroaches on the floor. _'How did these little bastards find there way in here in the first place. Could dad have let them in when he left the vault?,' _he questioned to no one in particular.

He got up, turned to his left, and ran down the hall towards the stairs, only to be stopped by perhaps the last person in the vault he wanted to see, Butch DeLoria. "You gotta help me man, my mom's trapped in our apartment with the radroaches." He said, hysterically.

"Wow, Butch is asking me for help. If only you knew what 'Irony' meant," Angelos said sarcastically.

"Yeah, I'm asking you. So what?" Butch said threateningly, then continued in more somber tone, "Look, I'm sorry for the way I've always treated you. You know I never meant any of It, right?" The last part was obviously forced, but what came after that shattered any reservation Angelos had, "But, its my mom, you can't just leave her in there with the radroaches." he said with a tone of barely restrained urgency.

Sighing, Angelos said, "Alright, fine, but you owe me big time for this, _you got that_?" The distaste and frustration in those last three words was almost palpable.

"Fine, done, just please, get her out of there!" Butch replied almost becoming hysteric again, before turning around and running down the hall and around the corner to his left, with Angelos hot on his heels. They arrived at the door where the sounds of scuttling, and Mrs. DeLoria's cries of pain were easily distinguishable. Taking a deep breath to calm his nerves, Angelos pulled out his BB gun and hurried through the main living area to the bedroom where he saw Mrs. DeLoria on the floor in a curled up position being snapped at by three radroaches. Angelos closed his eyes to try and come up with a plan, _'Alright I've got to get kill the roaches without harming her in the process, but how do I do that when my targets are scuttling all over the place around the person I need to protect. C'mon think Angelos, THINK!' _All of a sudden he felt his heart rate shoot upwards like a rocket, and he could feel his movements speed up. When he opened his eyes he was surprised to see that everything had slowed down drastically, not pausing to wonder about this new phenomenon he quickly shot all three roaches in their large abdomens. Time quickly caught back up to him as he saw two roaches fall over, unmoving, while the third turned to face him and started to move forward, intent on hurting the being that just put a nicely sized hole in its ass(AN: that is essentially what an abdomen is, after all). Still disorientated from being able to move normally again, Angelos didn't notice the roach until it had already bitten his ankle. "FUCK!" he yelled as he jumped backwards out of the bedroom, the roach still following. Cursing his pain, he quickly whipped out his new police baton and brought it down on the roaches head, finishing it off.

Angelos walked into the bedroom again, ignoring his throbbing ankle, to see if Mrs. DeLoria was okay. After helping her up and hearing her thanks he got out a stimpak and injected it into his injured ankle, watching in fascination as his wound, and his pain, faded away. He made to go outside, but was stopped by an overjoyed Butch, "You did it! My moms' gonna be okay! You're the best friend I've ever had man. Hey, look I know it's not much but...I want you to have my Tunnel Snakes jacket, as a way of saying thanks." He said holding the leather jacket for Angelos to take. Angelos took it and put it on smirking, _'I look pretty bad ass with this on.,' _ he thought before saying, "Thanks, Butch. You better get inside, it's dangerous out here." Butch complied and went into his apartment, but before he did Angelos added one last thing "Look after the vault while I'm gone alright." Butch just nodded before closing his door. Angelos turned around and ran for the door that led right to the diner area.

Once he reached the diner, the sounds of clicking drew his attention to three more roaches inside surrounding the dead body of Grandma Taylor. Quickly dispatching the three nuisances with his trusty bat, Angelos knelt beside his fellow vault dweller's body to pay his respects. After a minute he got up and resumed his run, down the hall and up the stairs to the next level, where the classroom and his father's _former_ medical office were located. _'Maybe my dad's computer has some clue as to what the hell he was thinking when he decided to leave our home.'_ he thought as he made his way up the stairs. Once there he was greeted by the sight of the vault's mister handy model robot, Andy, burning a large group of roaches with his built in flamethrower. He was put on edge when he saw Officer Gomez appear from behind the wall, but relaxed when he started to talk.

"You're lucky it was me who found you, the others won't be so forgiving. I don't know what you're doing, and I don't want to know. Look, if you clear out of here, I'll forget that I ever saw you.," he said.

"Thanks Officer Gomez, that means a lot, but I still have to look through my dads office to see if there are any clues as to why this happened, then I'll get out of here.," Angelos replied.

"Alright, you do what you gotta do. For the record, I'm sorry things turned out this way. I can't believe what happened to Jonas, Officer Mack was out of control. You're a good kid you know, you don't deserve any of this," Officer Gomez said before turning around to patrol the immediate area for more roaches.

Angelos entered the office to see Stanley, the vault's mechanic, repairing Andy, who appeared to be doubtful of Stanley's repair abilities, if the way he was complaining was any indication. Angelos didn't pay them any mind as he rummaged through the front and back offices looking for anything that could tell him what his father was up to. _'Okay lets see what I found here: 2 more stimpaks, some old junk, and a Vault-Tec limited edition bobble head, medicine edition. "The smart man knows that a bandage only hides his wounds.," very profound.' _One last run through of his father's office yielding nothing of merit, until he looked at his father's framed bible quote hung on the wall. _'Mom's favorite quote:_

"_Revelation 21:6:_

_I am the Alpha_

_and the Omega,_

_the beginning_

_and the end._

_I will give unto him_

_that is athirst of_

_the fountain of_

_the water of life freely."_

_'My only reminder of her, I can't loose my dad too, he's all I've got left of my family.' _It was then that he noticed that the framed quote was on a hinge. _'what the...what is this?'_ He pulled the frame away from the wall, and saw a safe, _'well now, looks like I found something interesting.,' _He tried to open the safe only to be met with failure. _'Guess I need some more experience with lock picking to open this. Shit, looks like I'll have to leave it for now.' _He exited the medical offices and continued through the door that led to the atrium.

Going up the stairs that led to the atrium's lower level he heard two voices that caused him to pause, over the annoying alarms that still continued to sound off. "It's our only chance, don't you see? We're getting out of here, just like the doctor. I'm not going to let anyone stop us."

_'That sounds like Tom Holden. What is he doing here?' _Thought Angelos. He continued to walk up the steps and found Tom and Mary Holden standing behind a pillar. Before he could say anything to the two of them though, Tom ran off towards the corridor that led to the vault's entrance, yelling, "It's me, Tom! Don't Shoot!" Alas, his pleas fell on deaf ears, because just as he entered the corridor three shots rang out. "Tom! NO!" shouted Mary as she ran to try and help Tom, ignoring Angelos' cry of "Don't do it!" A moment later two shots were heard, accompanied by the sound of something heavy hitting the floor.

Angelos closed his eyes and fought his revulsion at the thought of vault security gunning down the people they were supposed to protect. He ran up to the left of the door and put his back to wall, taking a breath he peeked around the corner and was greeted by Officer's Richards and O'Brian, both holding 10mm pistols, guarding the door to the vault entrance. Ducking back behind the wall, Angelos had to take a couple of deep breaths to calm himself down and think up a plan. _'Alright I have three options. 1. I rush the murdering bastards and take them down before I'm shot to death, not likely; 2. try and sneak by so they don't see me; or 3. disarm them from a distance, then knock them out and take their weapons so they aren't a problem in the future.' _Thinking it over for a minute he made his decision, taking out his BB gun, he carefully looked around the corner again and took aim...

***Bang*** Officer O'Brian dropped his gun as the BB hit his right hand. ***Bang*** Officer Richards grasped his upper right arm in pain. _'Damn,'_ thought Angelos, as he readied himself for another shot. ***Bang* **This time Richards dropped his gun as well. Angelos began his run down the hall at the two surprised officers, his bat at the ready and struck Richards over the head, knocking him unconscious as expected. What he didn't expect was for the bat to break on the helmet with a loud groan then ***crack***, Angelos was stunned, just looking at the stump of what used to be his childhood plaything turned weapon. He didn't register what was happening until he heard a ***click***, accompanied by O'Brian saying "You're a sneaky little shit aren't you? Put your weapon down and come with me...we're going to have a little chat with the Overseer."

"You'll have to drag me there kicking and screaming. I have my own mission right now, to go find my dad." Angelos said, standing up and facing O'Brian, a look of disgust on his face. Watching the gun that was trained on his head. On the outside he looked calm, but on the inside he was panicking, his heart racing once more. _'SHIT! How am I going to get out of this, he's got a pistol and all I've got is a busted bat, a police baton, and a BB gun. Dammit if I don't think of something I'll be sporting a few new holes __on my person...wait, what's this...again?!.' _He was pulled from his thoughts by the same feeling as when he saved Mrs. DeLoria, everything had slowed down once more. He could see O'Brian's lips moving so slow that every word probably would have been drawn out over the next 5 minutes. _'What is this, what is causing this to happen to me. How can I move so fast, and for only a short time. Well I guess I'd better take advantage of the situation before whatever this is wears off.' _Not wasting any time, he hurled the broken bat handle at O'Brian's head, before he pulled out his police baton and extended it, ready to fight as everything sped back up.

O'Brian was surprised, to say the least, when Angelos suddenly moved faster than he could track and threw the broken bat at his head, before he fell unconscious due to blunt force trauma to the head. "Whew, that was close." Angelos said, obviously relieved, "Now what the hell was that back there, why did everything suddenly slow down?," he questioned as he was picking up the two 10mm pistols and police batons carried by the guards, along with any ammo they had, and cursed as he tried to open the door to the vault entrance only to find it locked. He was still pondering the phenomenon while walking up the stairs to the left of the corridor he was in. He was stumped until..._'Wait a minute...my Pip-boy 3000 is a system that is full integrated into my body so it can analyze and notify me if there is anything wrong with me. Maybe it has the answers.' _He reasoned. He lifted his arm to look at the Pip-boy screen, his curious look was replaced with surprise when instead of a readout on his condition, he saw a message titled V.A.T.S., _'What is this V.A.T.S.?'_

It read:

_Vault-Tec Assisted Targeting System:_

_Using it's integration into the central nervous system the Pip-Boy 3000 can, in times of increased stress levels, increase adrenaline production by a factor of 6. This in turn increases perception, speed, reaction time, and reflexes to near superhuman levels, allowing for increased targeting capacity to the point of being able to target specific points on the body. This particular function can only be used for up to 3 minutes at a time, however, and requires significant energy derived from the person linked to the Pip-Boy 3000, and will require a small amount of time to recharge to the point of being used again._

Angelos read through the message and nodded his head, _'increased stress is a nice way of putting it,' _he thought dryly. Reaching the top of the stairs he turned to his left and began walking towards an open door way across the room when he heard a muffled shout coming from his left, "YOU, this is all your fault, you and your dad. He just had to go and ruin it for the rest of us." shouted a random vault dweller from behind a window. Ignoring the man's ramblings he walked into the next room and was confronted by security chief Hannon.

"You, your father betrayed us all." Hannon yelled as he charged, police baton at the ready. Angelos barely had enough time to bring up his baton in defense as the older man swung. ***thunk***, the batons crashed against each other stunning the two. Angelos recovered first, and charged Hannon swinging his baton for Hannon's left leg. ***whack***. The baton struck, and Hannon hit the floor writhing in pain, clutching his leg. Angelos quickly sent him to dreamland with a well placed strike to the head.

_'The overseer's office isn't to far from here. I just need to make it past the security office and whoever is still inside, and I'm home free.' _he thought, but when he neared the door to the he heard a familiar voice, on the verge of tears say "I told you, I don't know anything!"_ 'That's Amata's voice what is she doing here?' _He walked up to the window of the Security office and looked in to see the Overseer and Officer Mack standing over Amata who was sitting in a chair and if the bruises on her face were any indication, those two had been hitting her trying to get information on him. His fears were confirmed by the Overseer's next sentence."Be reasonable Amata, Officer Mack may enjoy this but I don't. Just tell us where your little friend is so we can talk to him." Angelos was seething in rage at the lengths the Overseer had gone to to find him._ 'That bastard ordering officer Mack to beat his own daughter for information, I'll kill him for this.' _he thought. As he was just about to burst in there to save his childhood friend he heard something that made his blood run cold...

***bang* *bang* *bang* *bang***

He slowly turned his head back to the window, and was astonished to see officer Mack drop to the ground dead. The Overseer was currently wide eyed and open mouthed in shock, as he backed away from the smoking gun being held by his daughter. Amata seemed to be in shock that she had just taken someone's life as she had a look of disbelief on her face. She suddenly ran out of the room, and down the hall, not even seeing Angelos standing right outside the door.

Walking into the room, Angelos looked at the overseer, who was currently standing in a corner with a dazed expression on his face. He quickly snapped out of whatever thought were going through his head as soon as he noticed the one person, he had been looking for this whole time. "I hope you're here to turn yourself in young man. You're already in enough trouble already. Don't make it worse for yourself."

The reaction that the Overseer had been hoping for was immediate submission and compliance, he had not been expecting this boy to suddenly burst into a sinister laugh.

"HAHAHAHAH, you must be joking. I really don't think you are in any position to be telling me what to do, after all your only protection is currently bleeding out on the floor." Angelos said, not trying to hide the malicious intent behind his words.

The Overseer, more than slightly perturbed by the tone in Angelos' voice, spoke. "Be that as it may, you are still in my vault under my rules. So I must insist that you give me those weapons and give yourself up." he said with shaken confidence.

"You just don't get it do you, you senile old fool, you don't have any power here. I've knocked all of the other guards unconscious, stolen their weapons and you have nothing to defend yourself with. Now you are going to just stand right there while I speak, _you got that_." It was a demand rather than a question, but all the same the Overseer just stood there and nodded his head, knowing that he did not in fact, have anything to use against this obviously furious teenager. "Good, now then I have a question for you, why did you allow officer Mack to kill Jonas?"

"Jonas was a vault security liability, he had allowed your father's idealistic nonsense to poison his mind. He honestly believed that we could benefit from opening the vault to the outside world." said the Overseer with no remorse, as Angelos began to visit each of the lockers placed all around the room, taking pistols, ammo, security uniforms, and whatever else he could find.

Angelos turned around at that answer and said in an elevated voice, "Jonas was my friend you heartless bastard, and given what's been going on since then, I'd say he was right. Look at this mess, Grandma Taylor was killed by radroaches in the diner, and Tom and Mary Holden were killed by the two gorillas you stationed at the vault exit. That makes four deaths on your conscience, and here you are acting like you don't care in the slightest. You didn't even bat an eyelash when you had your daughter beaten in front of you. I don't know how you lost the part of your humanity that allows for empathy, and at the moment I really don't care." he said through grit teeth. "Now I am going to follow my dad, so give me the key to your office, and the password to your personal terminal and I'll be on my way." he finished.

The Overseer's look of shock was all that was needed to figure out his answer, but he just decided to see what the man had to say before responding. "You'll get nothing from me. I'll die before I see the vault compromised again." he replied.

"I'm not going to kill you Alphonse." said Angelos, using the Overseer's real name for the first time.

"Then it looks like were at an impasse...Ooof" he said right before he was hit with a wicked left hook from the very pissed off Angelos.

"I'm not going to kill you, even if it's what you deserve. So that punch will have to be a fitting revenge for all the shit this vault has been put through by you. Now I would advise that you just stay there and not interfere any further." he said before running out the door and down the hall.

He entered the door to his right and inside the room, in front of the desks he found the body of Jonas. He felt his body freeze up at the sight of his friend just laying on the ground, unmoving. As with Grandma Taylor before, he knelt down to pay his respects, only to pause when he saw a holotape clutched in Jonas' hand. Picking it up, he saw the title _A note from dad_, leaving no doubts that his father left this for him. _'I'll have to look at this later.' _he thought as he logged the data on the tape into his Pip-Boy.

Angelos got up and ran to the open door to his left to find a somber Amata sitting at the table in her's and the Overseer's private living residence. "You alright?" she jumped at the sound of his voice.

"Of course I'm not alright, I just killed a man. I...I mean he was about to hit me again and I...I just lost it.," she choked out.

Angelos didn't say anything, but instead got down on one knee and hugged his best friend tightly. "I know," he said "I was about to bust in the room and kill him myself after I saw what he was doing."

Amata just looked at him with red eyes. "When I heard the shots, I thought that someone else had shot him. But, when I looked down at my gun, I just lost it." She keeled over and began crying again.

Angelos walked up to her and gave her a small hug. "Hey, it's going to be okay," He said.

"I don't know what to do. My own father caused all of this." She made a few gasps for breaths. "I don't know if I can ever face him again."

"Maybe you don't have to." Angelos said, when Amata looked up at him, curiosity evident in her eyes he continued, "Escape with me. We can leave this place, and when we find my dad I'm sure he can help us."

Amata just shook her head, "I don't know, I don't know. Part of me wants to stay here and try and reason with my father, but then I think back to what you said to him..."

"Wait...you eavesdropped on us?" He said incredulously.

"I heard you start laughing from all the way down the hall, I came back in time to hear that you knocked all the other guards unconscious, and left before you came out." She explained.

"I'm sorry you had to hear all of that." He said remorsefully.

"It doesn't matter now, but you better get going. It's only a matter of time until whatever security is left finds you. Before you go, go ahead and rummage through mine and my father's rooms. Whatever you find will have to be more useful to you than me." She said.

Angelos nodded and proceeded to go through each room, emerging a minute later with a new 10mm pistol, complete with ammo, 5 bobby pins, and the key to the Overseer's office.

Amata got up from the table, and Angelos walked forward and gave her one last hug before saying, "My offer is still open, meet me at the vault door if you decide to come with me." Then he released her and walked across the hall the the door leading into the Overseer's office. Using his newly acquired key, the door slid upwards with a hiss and he walked inside, shutting the door behind him. Leaving Amata to ponder her future.

Deciding against hacking the Overseer's terminal for now he instead walked up to the lockers on the side of the room, his decision paid off. Inside he found 120 10mm rounds, some Mentats, some Stimpaks, and the Overseer's terminal password, _'Amata, huh. Typical.' _He thought as he walked up to the terminal. He entered the password and watched as the data on the terminal was unlocked.He saw four entries: Security Dossiers, Scouting Reports, Vault-Tec Instructions, and Open Overseer's tunnel.

He opted to look through the other entries first. _'Alright, lets see what kind of skeletons the Overseer's been hiding in his closet.' _As he read through the files on the computer he found himself, more and more, wanting to put a bullet between the Overseer's eyes. _'He lied to us this entire time, he fucking sent people out of the vault to this "Megaton", and conveniently forgot to tell anyone anything. Granted the giant ant is cause for worry, but he should have told us that the "Capital Wasteland" was no longer irradiated. He also used the Tunnel Snakes to further his agenda inside the vault as well. This man isn't fit to be a leader, he's just a manipulative little snake bent on total control. This info on the G.E.C.K. though, is very interesting, a machine that can create life from lifelessness. It's a shame Vault 101 doesn't have one, I would have loved to have something like that.' _Downloading all relevant information to his Pip-Boy he clicked on the last option and turned around to see the desk in the middle of the room rise up, revealing a dimly lit tunnel. _'Paydirt.' _he thought. He took a deep breath, steeling his nerve for the events to come that would drastically alter his future. He walked down the step, and flipped the switch at the bottom of the steps, closing the entrance behind him.

_Amata POV_

_'What should I do? What should I do?' _Was the thought that kept going through me mind. _'I don't know, if I go with Angelos I may never see my home again. If I stay here, there's no telling what my father might do?' _In the distance I heard the distinctive noise of the secret tunnel opening, telling me Angelos was already moving for the vault door. I hear the noise again, and know that he closed the tunnel. _'I wonder what kept him from opening the tunnel straight away?' _Curiosity getting the better of me, I walk into my father's office and up to his terminal. _'I'm in luck, Angelos didn't log out before he left. Now let's see what is so interesting.' _I read through the Security Dossiers and my eyes widen in shock. _'Wh...What is this?' _I read further, and further and became more and more distressed at everything my father has hidden from everyone. I suddenly hear klaxons _'Angelos must have begun the door opening sequence. I've made up my mind, I can't stay here. My father is beyond saving, and I know I can help Angelos.' _With new strength I open the Overseer's tunnel and begin running for the vault exit. _'I hope I make it there in time.'_

_Angelos POV_

I had done the impossible. I had opened to door to the outside world. I could see a cave beyond the door and at the end of that cave was sunlight pouring through the cracks in an old wooden gate that led outside. I can hear some guards yelling from behind the door leading into this room, and I know I have to hurry, I begin walking down the steps when I hear a voice that makes me stop in my tracks. "Oh my God! You did it! You really did it!" it exclaims. I turn around to see Amata standing there with a gobsmacked expression on her face. I feel a sense of elation, this meant the Amata had decided to come with me. I admit for a second I didn't think she would, and that she would opt to stay here with her nutjob of a father.

"Does this mean you're coming with me?" I ask hesitantly. I'm relieved when she nods her head,

"Yeah, I've decided that I can't stay here anymore." She says as she walks towards me, she leans up and plants a small kiss on my cheek. I can feel my face heat up as I ask

"Wh...What was that for?"

She giggled and said "For comforting me back there, and offering me a place to go now that I decided to leave this place."

"Anytime, now lets get out of here before anyone comes through that door." I say, she nods and we both turn towards the exit and begin walking. Unfortunately, it was just too late as a gunshot reverberates through the room and a bullet ricochets off the floor at my feet. "That's far enough you two, now turn around and give yourselves up." We turned around to see the Overseer and officers Richards and O'Brian, pistols in hand, looking at us with nothing short of fury on their faces.

Our two groups just stared at each other for a what seemed to be hours, until the Overseer saw fit to break the silence. "Amata, what do you think you are doing? Aiding this fugitive, are you really willing to give up your home, your family, to go out into that horrid excuse of a world?"

To which, Amata responded "It's better than living in a society based on lies. I saw everything on your personal computer. This entire vault believes that we are one of the few groups of humans left. I'm not going to be a part of this charade anymore."

The Overseer looked disappointed in his daughter. He said "Very well then, I'm afraid I cannot save you then. I am the Overseer above all else, men you may do what you have to, to keep the vault safe."

Upon hearing this I knew we had to get out of here fast, thankfully I saw that the officers were only equipped with new police batons. I spun around grabbed Amata, and pushed her ahead of me yelling "MOVE, WE HAVE TO GET TO THE DOOR." We started running, paying no heed to the Overseer's poorly aimed shots ricocheting around us, nor to the footfalls of the officers running to stop us.

We ran through the door and up the slope, when we reached the top we noticed that the officers had stopped right at the door, afraid to come any further from their "safe zone". They stood there and stared at us for a few seconds before turning around and walking away, a moment later the vault klaxons blare and the distinctive sound of grinding gears are heard as the door to Vault 101 slid closed once again, locking us outside for good.

The two of us just sat there in the darkness just catching our breath after everything that happened. I looked towards the flimsy wooden gate that apparently had kept Vault 101 undiscovered for so long. I looked at Amata, and she looked at me and nodded her head. I take a deep breath as I grip the doorknob, I turn the knob and push allowing the cave to be flooded with daylight. So much so that the two of us had to squint as we walked forward, out of what was our home for the past 19 years...

and into a whole new world.

----end chapter---

A/N: Cut and print. That's a wrap people.

This concludes the first chapter of my first solo fic. The Wasteland Wanderer's. I hope you all liked it as much as I do.

Now onto some of the issues you might address:

1. How long will this fic be? Unknown, if everyone likes this first chappie well enough I'll add more. If that's the case it will probably include the entire game(optional quests included), and (if I feel like it) the 5 DLCs. Broken Steel, Operation: Anchorage, The Pitt, Point Lookout, and Mothership Zeta.

2. Levels, exp, and so on? I'm still currently working on how to integrate a level system into this fic, so don't expect much from me until I get that worked out.

3. Follows the game strictly or no? A little of both, I can't tell you everything but suffice it to say, I do have some ideas that do go off on a tangent where the game is concerned.

One last note, if anyone wants to become an official beta reader for this story, send me a PM detailing what you know of Fallout 3(knowledge of Fallout's 1 and 2 is not required, but good to have), and how you believe you would help the overall quality of this story.

That's all for me readers. I eagerly await your responses. (Please note that flamers will be hunted down by a horde of hungry Deathclaws) Thank you.


	2. Following in his Footsteps

HELLLLOOO, Fanfiction(dot)net, this is Dreadman75, coming to ya loud and proud from (static). So how are ya all doin' out there these days, this is the second chapter of The DC Defenders. Now, if you recall, our heroes have just stepped out of that hole in the ground known as Vault 101. What will they find? Who will they meet? Why am I asking you all this? Just read and slate your curiosity my readers.

That was a terrible Three Dog impersonation. I must apologize, I just couldn't help myself. Oh, and I don't own Fallout 3. On a more serious note, I am sorry it took so long to get this out. I've had a lot of college work to do, and this just kept having to take a back seat. But on the bright side Thanksgiving and Christmas are coming up so you might expect one or two more updates before the new year.

And now we have some character statistics:

Angelos escaped Vault 101. LEVEL UP!

Level 2

New Perk: Lady Killer

S.P.E.C.I.A.L.:

Strength: 7

Perception: 5

Endurance: 5

Charisma: 1

Intelligence: 7 (17 skill points per level)

Agility: 7

Luck: 8

Skills:

Barter: 11

Big Guns: 19

Energy Weapons: 34 to 40 (Tagged)

Explosives: 19

Lockpick: 19

Medicine: 38 to 40 (Tagged)

Melee Weapons: 23

Repair: 38 to 40 (Tagged)

Science: 23

Small Guns: 23 to 30

Sneak: 23

Speech: 11

Unarmed: 19

Amata escaped Vault 101. LEVEL UP!

Level 2:

New Perk: Black Widow

S.P.E.C.I.A.L.:

Strength: 5

Perception: 7

Endurance: 3

Charisma: 4

Intelligence: 7 (17 skill points per level)

Agility: 7

Luck: 7

Skills:

Barter: 17 to 22

Big Guns: 15

Energy Weapons: 23

Explosives: 23

Lockpick: 38 to 40 (Tagged)

Medicine: 23

Melee Weapons: 19

Repair: 23

Science: 23

Small Guns: 38 to 40 (Tagged)

Sneak: 38 to 40 (Tagged)

Speech: 17 to 23

Unarmed: 15

Ch.2 Following in his Footsteps

_Angelos POV_

We walked forward, and waited for the glare to fade, I glanced upwards to get my very first look at the sun. Judging from it's position that it was late afternoon, my Pip-Boy confirming the time to be around 5:00. When we looked around, we found that we were standing on a small rocky outcropping, giving us a good view of the surrounding area. Laid out in front of us were the ruins of what the Overseer's scouting party called "Springvale". It was trashed, all that was left were what couldn't even be called houses, but more like wooden skeletons with debris cluttering up the insides. To our left I saw the remains of an old school building; it's structure was still mostly intact and would make a good shelter.

I looked at Amata and saw that she was a bit overwhelmed by the sight. In an attempt to break her stupor I said, with sarcasm evident in my voice, "So this is the Capital Wasteland, looks nice enough," She looked at me with one eyebrow raised and a smirk on her face.

She looked back out over the desolate landscape and said "It's nice to actually see the real sun and feel the wind. You know I've always wondered what the outside world was like, and seeing it for the first time...," she trailed off, unable to find the right words.

I finished her sentence for her, trying to lighten the mood, "I hear ya. This place is a dump," to which she snorted at, I continued, more serious than before "but we can't go back now. The vault is closed again, and given what happened after the war, it'll take a good 200 more years to open back up again," I said sullenly. I turned to look at her and asked the question that had been dominating my thoughts since she appeared at the vault exit, "So what made you choose to come with me? When I saw your dad standing there with a gun pointed at us I kind of spaced out."

"After, you went into the office I went back to thinking about your offer. I didn't notice anything until I heard the sounds of the tunnel opening and closing about 5 minutes later. After realizing that, I began to wonder what took you so long to open it in the first place. So I walked into my dad's office, figuring it had something to do with the terminal in there, and, as luck would have it, I saw that you had forgotten to lock it out, so I logged on and began running through the files my father had saved in there." She said, growing sadder and sadder the more she spoke.

"I'm sorry you had to see those, I knew you loved our home more than I ever did. I never really thought that you would leave though."

She looked at the ground. "Well those files shattered any illusions that Vault 101 was where I belonged. My father's been lying to us, all of us, for so long, and when I found out I couldn't take it anymore. I couldn't see any part of him I could try and reason with." She replied, tearing up once more.

I gave her a reassuring hug, and said "That's all behind us now, I don't blame you for anything that happened down there, the only thing to do from here is press forward, after all, I have a feeling that in order to survive out here we'll need to stay sharp, and constantly be on the lookout for trouble."

I sat down on a nearby rock and began to tally up our supplies. She sat down next to me and asked "What do we have?".

To which, I replied " 3 10mm pistols with ammo, 3 sets of Vault 101 security armor and helmets, 4 police batons, 3 additional jumpsuits, 12 stimpaks, and a Med-X hypo, and some random junk I scrounged up. Do you have anything else?"

"I have about 5 bottles of water, some bobby pins, 5 more stimpaks, the 10mm and ammo I stole from my father, and that's about it." She said.

Going over the small list made something click in my mind. "Hold on," I said, "I have a holotape here from my dad. I can't believe I forgot about it, but given what's happened since then I can't blame myself."

"Where did you find that?" asked Amata.

"...Jonas was gripping it in his hand. While I was paying him my respects I noticed it just laying there." I said in a low voice.

"Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to bring that back up." She apologized.

"Don't worry about it, lets just listen and see what dad has to say." I said the play button on my Pip-Boy. We both leaned closer to listen in as my dad's voice came through the speakers, _"Hold on Jonas. I need to record this first. I...I don't really know how to tell you this, I hope you'll understand, and I know you might be angry. I thought about it for a long time but in the end I decided it was best for you not to know. So many things could have gone wrong, and there's really no telling how the Overseer will react when he finds out. It's best if he can blame everything on me. Obviously you already know I'm gone, it was something I needed to do. You're an adult now, you're ready to be on your own. Maybe someday __things will change and we can see each other again. I can't tell you why I left, or where I'm going. I don't want you to follow me. God knows life in the vault isn't perfect but at least you'll be safe, just knowing that will be enough to keep me going. (Don't mean to rush you doc...but I'd feel better if we __got this over with). OK, go ahead. Goodbye...I love you."_

We both just stood there as the recording ended. I felt Amata look at me, but my eyes refused to look at anything other than the little computer on my wrist. I felt my eyes begin to tear up. _'Dad...you are an idiot.'_ was the thought that kept rushing through my mind as I walked up to the ledge of the outcropping and screamed my anger to the world. "AAAAARRRRRRGGGGGGGHHHHHH!!!" I kept yelling for I don't know how long, eventually my throat began aching in protest and I stopped and sat back down with my head in my hands. Amata walked over and sat next to me. "I can't believe he didn't trust me enough to tell me that he was leaving. I thought I knew my own father, but apparently he kept secrets, even from me." I said pitifully.

Still deep in though about what they had just heard, Amata finally said "I don't think that's what he meant to do."

"What do you mean?" I asked.

"I think he genuinely wanted to keep you our of danger," She explained, "so he wanted you to stay down in the vault. Too bad that's impossible now though."

"He still could have told me something. My dad may be smart, but in this case he was an idiot. I mean, given how zealous your father was about no one leaving the vault, how could he not have expected me to follow him?" I said angrily.

Amata sighed and just looked at me with an expression close to pity. She stood up and walked to the ledge again, she turned around and spoke,

"Where do we go from here?" She asked.

_'I can't dwell on my dad right now. We need to use this time to find supplies and shelter, then we'll start searching for him.' _nodding my head, I got up and joined her.

"First, I think we should take a look around the destroyed houses down there," I said pointing to the town's remnants below, "but we need to work fast, It'll be nighttime soon and we'll need a place to stay the night." I began to walk forward when I remembered something, "Hold up, could you come here for a second?"

Amata looked at me quizzically before complying. I brought out a single stimpak and said, "Before we do anything else, lets heal up those bruises okay?" A look of realization blossomed on her face, cluing me in to the fact that she had forgotten about them like I had. I cupped her chin with my left hand, "This may sting a bit." I said, she nodded and closed her eyes. I took the stimpak and injected it right into her cheek, and she winced a bit from the pain. A few seconds later, her face was back to normal. "You alright?" I asked.

She nodded and said, "Thanks, now lets get going."

We began walking down a trail to the side of the outcropping, passing a few destroyed vehicles, until we came up on the first houses. "Alright, you take the ones on the right hand side, and I'll take the ones on the left." We split up and began our search.

_3rd Person POV_

"Holy..." Angelos said looking into a blue mail drop box on the outside the first house. _'This thing has three frag grenades inside. Who the hell puts grenades in a mailbox...and what the hell are these?' _He thought as he pulled out what looked like a strange inhaler and bulky syringe. "Weird." he muttered under his breath. He systematically worked his way through each house, even going so far as to look inside the other mailboxes for items. The only useful things he found were some more bobby pins, and an issue of Pugilism illustrated. He saw Amata come out of one of the houses across the street and said "Did you find anything useful?"

She shook her head and said, "just some more pins, some Scotch, and some Whiskey. What about you?"

"Your not going to believe this, but I actually found 3 grenades in a mailbox, along with this thing that looks like an inhaler, and this weird syringe." He said.

"Who puts grenades in a mailbox?" She asked.

"That's what I said, I also found some bobby pins, and this magazine entitled Pugilism Illustrated. All in all, not a lot of very useful stuff. Lets check out the next house." He finished.

They walked inside, being careful not to trip over any debris, when Amata saw something.

"Look, it's a safe!" She said. Indeed, there in the wreckage was a safe. It looked like it had rode out the apocalypse rather well, considering that the blue light was still shining on the door.

Angelos tried the door, it wouldn't budge. "I don't suppose you have any ideas on how to open this thing, do you?" He said, frustration evident in his voice.

Amata looked at the safe trying to find a place they could pry open, or anything else that could help them open the safe, and eventually noticed the keyhole on the door, all of a sudden, something clicked in her head. Taking out a bobby pin and a screwdriver, she inserted the pin into the keyhole and began to slowly rotate the the lock.

"What are you doing?" Angelos asked.

"Picking the lock, remember how I said I used these pins to get into my father's office?" She replied.

"Yeah..." Angelos trailed off, then it hit him, "ohhhhhh."

"That's right, I'm guessing that picking a lock on a secure door should at be, at least, somewhat similar to picking a lock on a safe." She said while continuing her efforts. After a couple of minutes of trying and adjustments she was rewarded with a click, and the safe door swung open. "Gotcha." She said with a sense of triumph, looking inside to see the fruits of her labor. She was well rewarded, obtaining a 10mm Pistol, some 10mm ammo, 2 bobby pins, 6 of what looked like Nuka-Cola bottle-caps, 2 tubes labeled Buffout, another weird inhaler, a Med-X hypo, and another one of the bulky syringes that Angelos had found in the mailbox.

"What do you think some of this stuff is?" queried Amata, showing her safe haul to Angelos.

"Beats me, lets just stash 'em until we can find someone who can tell us." Angelos proposed

Amata nodded, putting the supplies in her bag. (where do they put all the stuff they find anyway?) The two vault dwellers exited the house, and started to walk down the street, when they were met with a strange phenomenon.

"Is...is that music? Where is it coming from?" Amata said, amazement and curiosity in her voice, as she heard the rhythmic sounds of trumpets echoing off the houses.

"I have no id...hey, look over there." Angelos said, pointing to the point on the road where an intersection was located. There just hovering in the air, was what looked like a metal sphere. It hovered about 6 feet off the ground, was about 3 feet in diameter with 5 antennae coming off it's sides and slanting behind the sphere itself. What looked like grating on it's "face" was what was emitting the patriotic melody.

"What is it?" Amata asked, as they walked up to it to get a better look.

"No idea." Angelos replied. The sphere didn't show any kind of reaction at their approach. When they got up next to it they started looking at it from all angles, trying to determine it's purpose. All they could determine was that it was only supposed to broadcast whatever the person controlling them wanted. This was proven when the music stopped and a man began to speak, "Hello again, my dear America. It's me, your president, John Henry Eden, and I would like to talk to you about something important..." the rest was lost to them, because at that moment the sphere-like robot decided to to start floating away, as if summoned to a new location by it's unseen master.

"Does this mean that the old government survived?" Angelos questioned, "Maybe more of human society than we thought survived. I wonder who this Eden guy is? " He questioned, imagining a man, standing tall and confident, in a business suit, sitting behind a big wooden desk.

"I'm wondering how he controlled that thing, it looks like it can receive a radio transmission from over long distances. Where is he broadcasting from?" Amata said, looking all around them for some sort of tower that could be used for that purpose, after a minute though, she was forced to admit that it was a futile effort and gave up. "Let's keep walking, if the info from the vault scouting reports is correct then a settlement known as "Megaton" is nearby. We'll try to find a place to spend the night there. We better hurry to, the sun is going down." She said, looking at the horizon, where the sun was about to meet the land. Angelos nodded and they continued up the street.

They were walking further down the street toward the Red Rocket gas station, when Angelos spotted something of interest. "Look, an old Nuka-Cola machine." He said jogging towards the machine in question. Amata took notice of the nearby sign that read "Megaton", in large yellow paint with an arrow pointing up the road. "Look!" she yelled, "If we follow this sign we should be at Megaton in no time." She pointed up the road while Angelos was messing around with the Nuka-Cola machine, trying to open it up. "Hey, are you listening to me?" she said with a huff. "Yeah, yeah, just give me a second here, if I can make this thing work then we could have something refreshing to drink." he said hopefully.

"What makes you think there is going to be anything in-" ***clunk* *clunk* *clunk* "**...there?" she was cut off by three distinct clunks and Angelos holding three Nuka-Colas, with a smug smirk on his face. "Shut up." she said, frowning. Angleos just kept smiling, and held out one for her to take. She reluctantly took the beverage and twisted the top off "Cheers." Angelos said as they clanged their bottles together and drank their fill."Hmmmmm, it tingles going down, do you think that's normal?" Angelos asked. "I have no idea, after all we didn't have Nuka in the vault, remember?" she replied.

They finished the rest of their drinks in silence, by which time the sun had set leaving them in increasing darkness. Amata spoke up, "come on, Megaton can't be that much further away." she tugged his arm, forcing him to move up the street and into the rock covered hills. Once they reached the top they found a second sign pointing directly at a giant hunk of what looked metal. Once they got closer, they saw that it was a giant wall, at least 20 feet high, made of metal. "Think this is it?" Angelos asked. "It looks almost exactly like the picture in the scouting report, so I'd say yes." Amata replied, a hint of sarcasm visible in her tone. They proceeded to the large gate, passing a deactivated protectron wearing a cowboy hat and sheriff's badge. Walking up to a part of the wall with a giant airplane engine above it they looked around for a way in, after about ten minutes of fruitless searching Angelos started to shout, hoping someone would hear them and open the gate.

"HEY, IS ANYONE IN THERE? WE NEED TO GET INSIDE. HELLO?" Angelos shouted at the wall.

"You're wasting your time." they jumped at the voice that came from their right. It came from a dark skinned man standing by some rocks a little ways away, to their right. He was wearing a yellow jumpsuit with a brown cap and goggles, on his back was shotgun.

"Who are you? And why exactly are we wasting our time?" Angelos asked, put on guard at this man's sudden appearance.

"Me? They call me Lucky Harith, I'm a local trader." said the newly named Lucky, not put off one bit by Angelos' aggressive tone. "I was just at my little campsite trying to get a good night's sleep when I heard you start shouting, and you are wasting your time because they don't let people inside at nighttime, too dangerous if you can't see a person's face very well. You would have to be well known around the residents to get let in at this time of night, otherwise if you keep up that banging you'll probably just get a bullet in your head courtesy of the towns peacekeepers."

"They would shoot us for wanting to get inside?" Amata said in disbelief.

"Where have you kids been? Everyone in the Wastes knows that you have to put caution above everything. Otherwise, you'll be dead before you've made it a week." he said in disbelief. "Wait a minute...you kids are vaulties ain'tcha?" said Lucky, noticing the jumpsuits with the large, yellow 101 printed on the back.

"Yeah, we came out of Vault 101. What of it?" Angelos said in a flat tone.

"Well I'll be damned, I never thought that Vault 101 would ever open its doors. That explains a lot. Look if you two wanna get into Megaton you're both gonna have to wait until morning. You'd better find a safe place to hunker down for the night, the Capital Wasteland is a dangerous place. Be warned though, just because you got in doesn't mean the residents will accept ya." He said, turning around and walking away.

"Wait! Where are you going?" Angelos called after him.

"I got a small campfire going down in the gulley, my brahmins waiting for me down there. I'm gonna be up here tomorrow if you wanna do some trading." Lucky said.

He disappeared into some nearby rocks and the two vault dwellers were left in silence. "Well now what?" Amata asked.

Angelos closed his eyes and started thinking. A minute later he reopened them "I've got an idea." he said, "I noticed an old school building, back in Springvale, that looked fairly intact. We could use that place as a shelter until morning. What do you think?"

"It's better than nothing, let's go." Amata said, turning around and walking back towards the trail that would take them back to Springvale, with Angelos walking right beside her.

A few minutes later they stood at the entrance of the old Springvale elementary school. The darkness making the building far more imposing to our protagonists. Amata gave Angelos a look of hesitation, saying that she was afraid of spending the night in a strange building. Angelos took her hand and squeezed it, calming her down. He gripped the handle, and slowly opened the front door, eliciting a long ***crrrreeeeaaaakkkk*** from the hinges. They waited a moment for their eyes to adjust to the dim light of the fluorescent lights overhead, when they were able to see what was in front of them, in the main foyer, they both stared in shock and disgust. For in front of them there were the dismembered remains of at least two people, one strapped to a mattress missing his head, and another hung from the ceiling by hooks embedded in his back, he was missing his head along with both of his legs. Angelos was green in the face from the scene and looked as though he would throw up at any moment. Amata, however, took it the worst and did the one thing that came natural to her at times like these...

She screamed...loud.

"AHHHHHHHHHH".

Her scream echoed off the walls of the old school, before fading into nothingness.

Angelos took his hands off of his ears, and looked at his friend. Amata kept staring at the gruesome scene shaking like a leaf. Angelos was about to talk to her when they heard the sound of footsteps rushing towards their location. They watched as a man with blond hair styled in a mohawk, brandishing a kitchen knife ran out into the open. He was wearing what looked to be armor that had been made using old garbage and car parts. He looked as though he hadn't cleaned himself in years, dirt covered him all over, and what teeth he still had were yellow and covered with grime.

After a moment the strange man yelled, "OH YEAH, fresh meat." He charged with a maniacal grin on his face, swinging the kitchen knife wildly.

Angelos, seeing that the man was obviously insane, tried to take out his pistol, but to his dismay the man was already on him, and he got a cut to his forearm for his trouble. "Argh." he grunted in pain before shoving the man back. He took out his police baton, holding it in front of him defensively. The man charged, but this time Angelos was ready. Angelos ducked under the knife and delivered a strike to behind the man's right knee. The man stumbled and hit the floor hard, but was still conscious enough to start shouting strings of profanities, and call for help, until Angelos knocked him out with a blow to the head.

Angelos looked at Amata, who was frozen to that same spot, staring in horror that someone had just tried to kill them unprovoked. Angelos ran over to her, grabbed her shoulder and shook. She blinked and looked at him, after a minute she found her voice "He...he just tried to kill you!" she said disbelievingly, pointing at the man lying on the ground.

"I know, but you have to list.... shit! We have to go now!" he almost yelled, the reason for such urgency being the sounds of yelling and feet pounding on the old linoleum floor. Whoever the unconscious man was he had friends, lots of friends. He grabbed her by the arm, and dragged her out of the building. They both ran towards the group of houses on the street, hoping to find a place to hide.

Unbeknownst to the two of them, however, they were being watched. A lone figure stood up on a hill overlooking the school, watching the events unfold from the inside of a fallen out house.

_??????? POV_

_'It was supposed to be an easy job, go to Springvale and check up on a increasing amount of raider activity that was reported by a local contact. When I got here I immediately noticed that the band of raiders inside the old school building was far larger than I was used to. I had thought about just rushing in guns blazing, but I had years of experience in the wastes telling me that, that approach was so stupid it could only be classified as suicide. So I opted to scout them out instead, and get some more info on my targets. For two days I just waited and watched the raider scum infesting the old elementary school building. There had to be a reason such a large group of these sub-humans have taken up residence here. Lucky me, it's my job to find out. Tonight I decided that I was going in, with my .44 Magnum cleaned and loaded on my belt, and my Chinese assault rifle on my back. I reviewed the plan I had thought up one last time:_

1. Take out the four guys guarding the fallen out portion of the school to the south so no one can come from the outside and surprise me.

2. Go in through the front door, and carefully work my way around the ground floor taking out any other raiders I see.

3. The second floor was where the leader would be, once his guards were all dead I could begin interrogating him, finding out why he and his flunkies were here in the first place.

4. If there are any other raiders in any part of the building, I go around and kill them all.

_It was a very simple plan I admit, but then again, raiders are so simple, they can barely be classified as people anymore. They barely had any grasp of strategy, they were disorganized, and to top it all off, they weren't expecting someone like me to come along._

_At least that's how it would've gone down if those two sorry excuses for wastelanders hadn't walked in and started screaming. They were going to alert the entire school that someone was there, and blow any chance I had at a surprise attack. After this the raiders would be on high alert for days, shooting at anything bigger than a cigarette carton that dared to come within 10 feet of that building.'_

I sighed to no one in particular, and ran through my options:I could try and go in once some of the raiders chased after them, less raiders, less problems...until they come back from killing and dismembering those poor souls, and find me wandering around their base._ 'hmmmm, tempting...but no' _I could go down there and take down the raiders chasing them and just bide my time until I can get in again, that would take some time, but I would save their lives and get to verbally abuse them for being so stupid, and I could kill some of the parasites right now.

After a minute I made my decision, ran a hand through my hair and sighed again "Why are these simple jobs _never _simple" I said in an exasperated tone. I looked over to a fallen support beam and picked up my cowboy-style hat, I put it on, straightened it and brought out my fully loaded .44 magnum. "Ah well...time to go to work." I said with a grim smile on my face as I started running down the slope leading to the other houses, my duster billowing behind me with every step.

--end chapter---

***gasp*** Who is this new mystery character? It should be pretty easy for veterans of the series, but all the same, a cookie to the first person to guess which group my OC belongs to. His name will be revealed next chapter, buuuuuuut if you want to try and guess his name I'll give you that opportunity. Here's an incentive, if you manage to get it right I'll let you put a character of your own into the story. Here are a couple of hints to help you along. Number 1: the number of question marks corresponds to the number of letters in his name. Number 2: I got his name from an text that is around 2000 years old but is still read today, it is very long and many people all across the world have read it.

Now for news. The stats displayed at the top of the chapter are what they would have in the game at this point. Let me know if you like it or not. If you don't I'll refrain from putting them up again. I guess that's it for now. Same deal as before, read and review, or I'll sick my pack of rabid Yao Guai on you. (Ha! I made a rhyme)

_I would like to thank my beta, erttheking, and my friends snipa, and KokiriLink for all their help in getting this chapter done. Your the best guys, thanks for all of your help and support! I hope you all are looking forward to chapter 3 as I am._


	3. A Small Detour

Welcome back to the DC Defenders. I'm your humble host Dreadman75. HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE! Sorry this is late, I was having some creative differences with my muse. But, we were able to work it out with minimal damage to my psyche at least. Enjoy!

I do not own Fallout. Fallout is the property of Bethesda Softworks.

Ch.3 Small Detour

_Angelos POV_

_'This would have to be one of my top three worst days ever.' _I thought as I ran for the houses along Springvale's main street, Amata was just a few steps behind me. Leaving my home, and winding up in this hellhole, and now I'm running for my life from a band of lunatics who want to kill me for who knows why.

The houses are getting closer and closer, when gunshots ring out in quick succession behind us. I take a chance and look back, through the darkness I can make out at least 5 people chasing us, thankfully they were still back at the school building entrance. I was relieved to see that it looked like only one was holding a gun. The others were wielding an assortment of improvised weapons, from tire irons to kitchen knives, and were trying to catch up to the two of us so they could put them to use. I turned back around to see that Amata had overtaken me during my distraction, "We have to find somewhere to hide!" I yelled to her. So didn't say anything back, but I saw the distinctive nod of her head indicating that she heard and understood.

By this time we had the street that led up into the hills that contained Vault 101. I stopped beside Amata to catch my breath for a moment. I could hear the yells of the people chasing us, and I couldn't help but wonder why they wanted to kill us. I pushed those thoughts to the back of my head, and once more focused on the task of getting away from them first, I could wonder about their motives when mine and Amata's lives weren't in danger. Looking around at the houses, I grabbed Amata's arm and began running for the house closest to the rock face.

We got inside and promptly tried as best we could to hide ourselves among the debris. We laid there, covered in dust, and waited. A couple of minutes later we heard them, there raspy drawls echoing throughout the empty streets. "Where'd ya go kiddies? c'mon out, we'll get to know each other." said one.

"We must have scared 'em off, they probably went back up to Megaton. Let's just get back before the boss decides to have our asses served to her on a silver platter." said another one.

"Man, are you stupid," replied a third, a woman from the sound of it. "Didn't you see what they were wearing?"

"No." answered the second.

"Ugh, you're hopeless." said the third once more. "They had those Vault 101 jumpsuits, they came out of the same place we want to get into. We'll catch them and make them tell us how to get in, and then everything in the vault is ours for the taking. With what we find in there, we'll rule this godforsaken wasteland. Not even those damn Brotherhood pansies will be able to stop us." She explained.

My eyes opened wide at these words, beside me I heard Amata stifle a gasp. I closed my eyes and listened closer, the woman that had spoken earlier was obviously the most intelligent of the group, hoping I could learn something I could use to stop them.

The woman spoke again. "Now all of you spread out and search these houses, they have to be around here somewhere. I want as least one brought to me alive, the other you can have your fun with." The people nodded their heads and began searching the houses furthest down the street from our location.

I grit my teeth together when I heard this. They were eventually going to find us, but I would be damned if I let Amata get hurt. _'After all, it was **my **idea to use the school as a shelter for the night.' _I knew what I had to do, I was going to make sure at least she survived and made it someplace safe.I steeled my resolve and reached for my bag. I brought out one of the 10mm pistols I had stolen in my escape, and began to stand up. Amata looked at me, terror still visible in her eyes, despite the dim light of the night. "_What are you doing?_" she whispered urgently.

I looked at her and whispered back, "I'm going to try and lure them away from you. When their gone I want you to run back up to the vault entrance, and try and get back inside Vault 101."

She stiffened, shocked by my statement, "What are you talking about? We have to run, if they catch you..." She gulped, to scared to finish that sentence.

"That's the point." I said sadly. "Dad was right, we should have stayed in the vault. It's just too dangerous out here. We didn't even make it a day out here. I mean, what if my dad's already dead, then what? Just do what I say, and when they're all gone, run as fast as you can for the vault door, okay?"

She looked like she would cry as she nodded her head to me. I breathed a sigh of relief, and got up into a kneeling position. There was one of the people in the house next to ours, he hadn't seen me get up off the ground. I took careful aim with my pis...

***bang***

A single gunshot rang out, and the man's head exploded. I looked down at my own gun wondering what had happened, I hadn't even touched the trigger and yet the man was laying barely 10 feet away from me without a head to speak of. I was brought our of my stupor by the woman from before, "What the hell was that?...You two go check it out, it came from that house down there."

I stiffened, if they came over here they would find us and then we would die for sure. Before I could panic, however, I heard a hushed voice from behind me. "Lay back down and don't move kid. I'll take care of these cretins, just do what I say if you want to live alright?" I wordlessly complied and lay back down on the ground, my mind having long since gone blank. I heard a soft rustle from behind me, indicating that the person that had been behind us had moved.

At that moment two men came into view just outside the house, barely 20 feet from where we were laying. One was holding a tire iron, with one end fashioned into a point, for stabbing. The other was holding a very deadly looking knife, complete with dried blood still on the blade. Even in the darkness I could still make out the insane look in their eyes, it was the same as the man I knocked unconscious back in the school building. I began to sweat, wondering when the mysterious voice from before would jump in and save us. _'That guy wouldn't just leave us to die, would he?' _The men were getting closer now, in a couple of seconds they would discover the dead body of their friend and, more than likely, us.

The men entered the house next to our own, and saw the blood and brain matter splattered all over the place. "Jesus." one said "Whatever it was took his head clean off."

"Did those two kids do this?" the other spoke.

"No, I did." a voice from behind them answered.

The men both spun around and were met with the visage of a man wearing what looked like a trench coat with the right arm missing. He was wearing a cowboy hat, which hid his messy hair. He was holding a revolver in his right hand, which was already pointed at the head of the man holding the knife. A pull of the trigger later and he was dead on the ground like his friend from before. The remaining man, brought out of his shock that this stranger had gotten behind him without a sound, tried swinging the tire iron at the newcomer. The stranger jumped backwards, dodging a strike meant for his head. He then quickly stepped up to the man and grabbed his wrist, twisting roughly the man dropped his makeshift weapon after an audible ***crack***. "ARGH! You son of a bit...***bang***" he couldn't get any other words out due to the bullet that had just been put in his skull.

"Stay there." he said. I could only nod, my mind to cluttered with thoughts to form a coherent answer. Next to me I saw Amata do the same, too shocked to speak. He turned around and began to walk out of the house. "W...where are you going?" Amata asked.

"The last two are still there looking for you. I'm going to deal with them." He said with no emotion, even though he had just killed three people. "Just stay put and be quiet." Then he walked out side the house.

A minute or so passed by, then we heard the sounds of gunfire. It couldn't have lasted for more than 20 seconds before everything was quiet once again. The sound of footsteps reached us and we both tensed, but relaxed when the man from before walked inside and up to our hiding place. "Both of you get up and follow me. We have to find a safer place to stay the night." he said. He then turned around and was about to start walking away when all of the questions that had been plaguing my thoughts since the moment we ran out of the school burst from my mouth.

"Hold on! We're not going anywhere until we get some answers. Just who the hell are you? Who were those people and why did they try and kill us for no apparent reason?"

The effect of my outburst was immediate. The man spun around and I could see a very serious, almost angry expression on his face. "In that order: I'm the guy who just took time out of his day, and ammo out of his bag, to save your collective asses. They..." he gestured to the dead men, "are known as raiders, and if you don't want more of them coming after you when I'm not around, I suggest you follow me." He said in a very annoyed tone.

Deciding that arguing with the man would eventually lead to a very unpleasant consequences, I nodded and held out my hand to Amata. She grabbed onto me and held fast. _'She must still be scared.' _I thought as we began to follow the man up a nearby slope to a lone house that overlooked the school building. The man walked inside and sat down on collapsed support beam, he took off his hat, revealing messy black hair, and set it on a nail sticking out from the wall. Amata and myself walked inside and took a look around.

The house was completely barren, save for the empty boxes of food and empty drink containers littered around, implying that this man had been up here for some time before we came along. Our attention was drawn back to the man when he spoke up "Go ahead and take a seat, we have a lot to talk about."

I quickly weighed our options in my head _'We could run, but where to? We don't have anywhere to stay and we might not even survive the night. This guy saved us, but why? Why would he stick his neck out for two people he doesn't know.' _I frowned, no matter how I looked at it the safest course of action was to stay here under this mans' watch. I sat down on a beam Amata was still hanging on my arm, she was still shaking. I took my arm out of her grasp, put it around her, and pulled her close. She leaned on me and began crying silently, I couldn't blame her, we had just stared death in the face and lived. I started rubbing her shoulder and she began to calm down. I said to him, "What did you want to talk about."

We faced the man and he began to talk "For starters, my name is Gabriel Raves. What about you kid?"

"My name is Angelos." I said. He nodded and looked at Amata "And you?"

She just looked forward for a minute before mumbling "Amata."

Gabriel just shut his eyes, as if he was committing it to memory. A minute later he opened them and said in a raised voice, "Alright, now would you mind explaining to me just what the hell two vault dwellers are doing out here? You almost got yourselves killed walking right into a raider outpost like that!"

My eyes narrowed at his tone of voice. "Wait a minute, how the hell were we supposed to know that school building was full of maniacs who wanted to kill us for no reason? We haven't even been outside Vault 101 for a full day."

"Is that so?" he replied, to which I nodded. "Well then, in that case it occurs to me that if you two are gonna survive your gonna need someone to tell you how things work up here." he finished.

My eyes widened in surprise and I said, "Wait...what? Just a few seconds ago you're mad at us for walking into that school building and now you want to help us? Why?"

"Simple really, if I don't help you then, most likely, you two will end up dead within a week. You see, I represent a group of people that believe in doing good in and for this world, and if you died when there was something I could do to prevent such a thing from happening..." he trailed off at the end only to continue a second later, "Let's just say don't want that karma on my soul."

"So you're doing this out of the goodness of your heart? I find that hard to believe." I said skeptically.

"Believe what you want. Fact of the matter is, unless you two wanna die, your gonna need someone to tell you how to step so you don't get on anyone's bad side." he said.

I was about to reply, telling him to go to hell, but Amata looked up at me and said to me "Let's take him up on his offer."

"What? Why?" I said, a little shocked.

"Think about it, how long would we have lasted if he hadn't come along. You were about to give up your life to save me..." she trailed off, her lip trembling and tears threatening to spill from her eyes, but she managed to reign it in and finish her point, "Let's just give him a chance, if he wanted to kill us he could have done it at anytime."

I sighed, but relented nonetheless. I said to her "Alright we'll listen to him, but I don't trust him." She nodded, and sat up, and we turned our attention back to Gabriel, who was still sitting on the beam, his eyes closed in thought.

"That's good." He said suddenly, opening his eyes and staring at me.

"What?" I asked.

"You don't trust me, that's good. Consider that your first lesson in surviving the capital wastes, never trust anyone. Always assume that anyone you talk to wants something from you." He replied, a ghost of a smile on his face.

I thought about it for second before saying "If that's true then what do _you_ want from us?"

He chuckled "Clever, what I want from both of you is for you two to stay alive out here. Simple as that."

"You don't want anything else?" I replied incredulously.

"You said you haven't even been out here for a whole day, I highly doubt you have anything worth taking." he stated.

I nodded at this "You're right we hardly have anything, just what we left the vault with, and what we managed to scrounge up in the Springvale ruins."

"I thought so. Let me take a look at what you do have. Lesson number two: always keep track of your equipment. That means regular inventory checks to make sure your prepared for whatever might come at you next, and making repairs to your clothes and weapons to keep them in working order."

I looked at Amata and saw her nod her head. We got everything we had with us and laid it out, in specific piles, on the ground between us and him. He picked up our pistols first and looked them over, inspecting the barrels, hammers, and triggers. He then took aim at a nearby beam and pulled the trigger, nothing happening due to the pistols being emptied of ammo beforehand.

He finished his inspection and said "All in all, these guns are in pretty rough shape, and are in need of serious repairs. If you don't repair them soon, there's a chance of them locking up on you, giving an enemy the opening to attack."

We both nodded and I said "That will be a little difficult seeing as how we've never used a gun before."

Gabriel sighed before saying "Not to worry, if you want I can show you how to maintain your equipment. We'll save that for later though." He looked over at the medical supplies and grunted as he took hold of the inhalers and syringes we found in the buildings.

I spoke up "What are those exactly, we found them down in the houses but we have no idea what they do. We were hoping to find someone who could tell us before we did something we regretted."

"That was a smart move kid, you see this inhaler?" He asked, again we nodded "It contains a very addictive drug known as Jet. When it's inhaled you get a short but intense rush of energy and strength."

"Wouldn't that be a good thing?" I asked. Gabriel just shook his head.

"Not when you go through the withdrawal, which given the drugs near 100% addiction rate is almost a certainty." he finished.

Amata and I could only sit in silence, thinking of the gravity of such a thing.

He lifted up the syringe next "This little doozy, on the other hand, is a little safer then Jet. It's called Psycho, it was a military drug used to increase the combat potential of soldiers before the Great War. Increasing adrenaline production, and reaction time while shutting down some higher brain functions and making soldiers almost immune to pain. Side effects from overuse included diminished intelligence, and permanent numbness in the outer extremities. It's also addictive, but not to the extreme of Jet."

"Sounds useful" Amata spoke up.

"Sometimes, just don't use it to much." Gabriel replied, setting the syringe down. He looked over the supplies again before looking at us. "Any questions so far?"

"You seem to know a lot about the Wasteland, how long have you been out here?" Amata queried.

"I've been here in the ruins of D.C. for for almost 15 years, but I was born somewhere very far from here. " Gabriel answered.

"Where were you before here?" I asked.

"Clear on the other side of the former U.S. On the west coast. I was born and raised in a village known as New Arroyo." He said.

"Why did you leave?" I continued.

"That is a long story for another time, besides I don't feel comfortable discussing my past with people I've just met." He replied, but for a moment I could have sworn I heard something akin to sadness in his voice.

_'That doesn't sound right.'_ I thought_ 'Why wouldn't he want to talk about his hometown? Did something bad happen and he had to leave? Is he hiding something from us? That would make sense, after all we __**have **__just met. I'll have to remember to ask about 'New Arroyo' in the future.' _ I just stared for a moment before relenting "Alright, if you were born on the west coast and you traveled all the way here to the east coast, that means you must have seen a lot, right?"

"Oh yes, I've seen so many different places: Texas, Maryland, New York City, and so many others. I've met a lot of people, and seen a lot of things. Now here I am, I've been helping the Capital Wasteland any way I can for the past 10 years." He said with pride.

At this point I decided it was a good time to bring up what had happened down in the town ruins. "So those people...those _raiders _I believe you called them?" the word left an odd taste in my mouth.

"Ah! Yes, of course, it appears we've gone off topic. 'Raiders'," he made quotation marks with his hands "is a term used to identify anyone person or group of people who make a living in this post-apocalyptic hell by preying on travelers and passers-by." He explained.

"Preying?" Amata asked hesitantly. I was afraid of the answer as was she, it appeared.

"Torturing, raping, and killing to get what they want. They are the people who don't fit in, in any settlement. So, they travel around looking for defenseless wastelanders to rob and kill." He detailed.

"That's horrible." Amata said, a hand placed over her mouth in shock.

"Yes it is. Their typical weaponry consists of whatever they can scavenge, which can range from tire irons and knives, to flamers and missile launchers. But do you want to know what the bitch of the matter is though? Despite all of that, they aren't even the biggest problem the out here in the wastes." exasperation was evident in his tone.

"They arent?" I asked.

"Nope, hands down, the biggest problem, both figuratively and literally, are the Super Mutants." Gabriel said.

"I'm probably going to regret asking this, but what the hell is a Super Mutant?" I asked.

Gabriel lowered his head for a moment, sighed, and began his explanation "Picture a normal human. Now take him/her and increase their height to about 7 or 8 feet tall, turn their skin a disgusting yellowish-green color, and increase their muscle size to where their muscles are bigger around than your head and have their veins pressed against the skin. Do that and you have a pretty good idea what a Super Mutant looks like."

"What..." was the only thing I could say as I just stared straight ahead.

"The super mutants are a menace up here. They occupy most of the DC ruins, and some areas out here in the wasteland. Their strong enough to rip you apart with their bare hands, but that's if your lucky," Gabriel continued, ignoring me. "They also have a habit of kidnapping people from time to time and dragging them off to who knows where, those kidnapped are never seen again. That's just what the normal super mutants are capable of."

"Does that mean there are different kinds of Super Mutants?" Amata asked.

"Only two that I know of. Those are called the Behemoths and the Overlords. The Overlords act as the ringleaders, giving orders and the like, you'll know 'em when you see 'em, they are easily upwards of 9 feet and are bulkier than the garden variety mutie. They can soak up enormous amounts of ammo, and can dish out damage just as fiercely. The Behemoths, on the other hand, lack most higher brain functions and operate on a sort of 'I see you, I crush you' sort of system. They stand over 12 feet tall and typically use large slabs of concrete, or light poles, as weapons. They, thankfully, lack the intelligence to use firearms, but they are phenomenally strong and they can take an enormous amount of damage before dying," He explained.

"What the hell happened to the world while we were in the vault?" I asked. I couldn't believe the things I was being told. _'Raiders, mutants, I guess my dad was right, the wastes are a very dangerous place for anyone to live' _I thought to myself.

"I know how you must feel, things up here on the surface only got worse after the Great War. The animals were mutated into hideous monstrosities that only want have humans for lunch. People go and kill others for personal gain, or the sheer enjoyment of it. Others capture, and sell their fellow human beings, and the Enclave..." Gabriel just trailed off. His eyes adopted a far away look, as he looked at the ground, his chin resting on his hand.

"Enclave, what's the Enclave?" Amata asked.

Gabriel looked up and continued "The Enclave is what was left of the old U.S. Government after the bombs fell, or so they themselves claim. Although, no one in the Capital Wasteland has ever seen them in person. Their leader, _President _John Henry Eden, uses remote controlled drones, called Eyebots, to spread his propaganda to the Capital Wasteland. Trying to get the populace on his side for his eventual reclamation of the wastes."

Me and Amata looked at each other for a moment. Gabriel must have picked up on something because after a moment he said, "Let me guess, you two ran into an Eyebot after you left the vault, and you got a front row seat to the bullshit Eden spewed."

"Now hold on," I said sternly. "If some of the old government survived, that's a good thing. They could help get the nation back on its feet, and try to reign in whatever problems it has."

"You really don't get it do you? The 'problems' you talk about can't be solved with deliberation, and bureaucracy. The 'problems' out here would just as soon kill you in all manner of horrible ways as soon as they look at you. This world has gone through hell, and when it came out the rules changed. The Enclave can't help this country, they would need hundreds upon thousands of men, and even then, that would just be the tip of the iceberg," Gabriel shot back.

"You sound as though you met them face to face." Amata said, trying to defuse the situation.

Gabriel shook his head, "I've never met the Enclave in person. However, while I was still on the west coast I heard that they had been a power there before I was born. I was told that they were cruel, killing anyone they saw as 'impure'. You see they had a policy that called for the extermination of anyone who was mutated by the nuclear fallout of the Great War. Unfortunately, that meant that every human on the surface was a candidate for their purge, no human that lives on the surface today has an unmutated gene in their body. The radiation saw to that, and now we are all deemed inhuman and a threat to the Enclave's new America."

"That's terrible," I said.

"Yes it is. Don't let it get you down though, just as there are threats to the people just trying to stay alive. There are also those who want to help protect the wastes," he said with a smirk.

"And they would be?," I asked, a smirk forming on my face as well.

"Well first and foremost would have to be the Brotherhood of Steel. They are an organization of people dedicated to the recovery of pre-war tech, and protecting the people of the wastes by way of heavy ordinance. They are the best equipped people in the wasteland, due to their ties to the former United States Military. They're easily recognizable thanks to the power armor they wear, and the distinctive energy weaponry they use," he explained.

"Are you a member of this 'Brotherhood of Steel', " Amata asked.

Gabriel chuckled "No I'm not a member of the BoS. I told you earlier that the people I work with are dedicated to doing good for this world. We are known as the Regulators, and our mission is to aid the wasteland by hunting down the despots and ner-do-wells that threaten the settlements across the wastes. That includes: Super Mutants, Raiders, Slavers, and all manner of evil doers out there."

"So what, you guys are like a police force?," I ask jokingly.

At this Gabriel actually laughed, "Hahahahaha, you could say that," he stopped for a moment to calm down "In all seriousness though, our job is no laughing matter. While most focus on overwhelming firepower and numbers, we have neither. We move in small groups, or sometimes even alone, and we are trained to stay unnoticed. Stealth is a factor not many account for these days, which is why we Regulators are able to sneak in, kill you, take proof of our kill, and leave. This also helped us garner a reputation as ghosts or phantoms, because we are both excellent at being stealthy, and the signature overcoats we wear, known as dusters, giving us an ominous look. People fear us and a scared enemy is an enemy that is more likely to make a mistake, that makes fear a very good friend of ours."

"That makes sense given how you snuck up and blasted that mans head off, and how you got behind the other two," I observed.

Gabriel nodded. "Just remember, just because we favor stealth doesn't mean we can't hold our own in a firefight. We are probably just behind the BoS in terms of equipment, we have the firepower, just not adequate protection to use it at it's full potential. Power Armor is very heavy and _that_ is detrimental to stealth oriented people like us."

Gabriel ended his explanation there and looked at us. We sat in silence for a few minutes, it was broken when a distinctive rumbling reminded me that neither Amata nor myself have had anything to eat since we opened the vault door. We both looked away from Gabriel, embarrassed. He just chuckled and began rummaging around in his duster. He pulled out three packages labeled 'Salisbury Steak' and handed two of them to us, and kept the last for himself. "It won't do to have to deal with empty stomachs, eat up," he said.

We took them with a thank you, and opened the package. As we began eating the surprisingly well preserved steak a thought struck me. "I'm feeling the same tingling sensation I had when we drank those Nuka-Cola's down in Springvale," I said.

"That's normal, after all it is irradiated," Gabriel replied, digging into his own steak.

Amata and I, as soon as he said that, abruptly stopped eating. We calmly swallowed the food in our mouths before, "...irradiated?," I asked, not quite comprehending it.

"Yup, the radioactive fallout may be gone from the air, but just about every source of food and water in the wasteland is irradiated. It's nowhere near lethal, at least it isn't if you take a good dose of Radaway periodically, or at the very least, some Rad-x if your going into a heavily irradiated area," said Gabriel, who continued to eat despite our clear reluctance.

"So everything you eat and drink is full of radiation? Isn't that a little dangerous?" I asked with a sense of urgency.

"Not really, as long as you don't ignore the symptoms of radiation sickness, and have plenty of Rad-x and Radaway," Gabriel said nonchalantly.

"So as long as we're careful it won't be a problem?" Amata asked.

"Precisely, as far as threats to your life go radiation poisoning is actually quite low on the list out here. It's around the same level as dying of natural causes nowadays," he joked.

He went back to eating as the silence wore on. Amata and I did the same, while trying to ignore the tingling sensation of radiation entering our bodies.

About 15 minutes later, we were done and myself and Amata were leaning on an intact wall getting ready to go to sleep when Gabriel spoke up, "So tell me, what are the two of you doing up here on the surface anyway? We don't get a lot of vaulties up here in the wastes."

Amata and I glanced at each other and I nodded. I told him our story, he just sat there, silent, listening to all I had to say. I told him about how life in the vault wasn't perfect but was better than life in the Capital Wasteland, about my 19 years down there with my dad. I told him about how my dad somehow opened the unopenable vault door and went out into the wasteland, and finally, I told him about Amata's and my own escape from the vault after the Overseer went on a power trip.

When I had finished I was amazed to find that my whole explanation had lasted almost an hour. Gabriel stood up and looked at us, "You two have, obviously, had a rough day. Go ahead and sleep, you need it. I'll stay up and make sure nothing sneaks up on us. I'll escort you to Megaton in the morning, with the little disturbance down in the school there are bound to be a few raiders wandering around looking for you," he said.

"What are we going to do there?" I asked.

"We're going to look for clues on your dad's whereabouts," he replied.

"'We're?' Does that mean your coming with us?," Amata asked.

"For now, at least until I can make sure you two can survive. I am a Regulator after all, it's my job to help defend the good people of the wastes. You two seem to be perfect candidates for that policy, so that means..." he trailed off, a grin on his face.

"We get a bodyguard with years of experience, and some serious firepower," I finished for him.

"Well I wouldn't say bodyguard. Think of me as...your teacher on how to live in this post-apocalyptic nightmare. Until I'm sure you can survive out here I'm going to be teaching you how to shoot, perform first aid, and everything else you'll need to know out here. So I would try and get a good night's sleep, because tomorrow morning class is in session," he said, his grin growing ever wider as he spoke.

As we fell asleep against the wall I couldn't help but shudder at what he said. The last thought that went through my mind before sleep overtook me was _'What have we gotten ourselves into?'_

-end chapter-

A/N: Eh, not as much action as the last two chapters I'll admit. However, this was an essential chapter for one reason: this was one of the things that kinda annoyed me in the game. You're just thrown out in to the Capital Wasteland with no sort of tutorial on how to do anything. They just kinda left you to do everything on your own. I decided to fix that little flaw, and now we have a helping hand in form of the Regulator known as Gabriel Raves. In this case the future Lone Wanderer has his best friend there to help him, and a veteran of the wasteland to show them both the way.

Rest assured, we will be seeing a lot of Gabriel in this fic. He is a character who will be both an additional gun, and a source of valuable information and guidance to Angelos and Amata.

Next chapter is Megaton. There our heroes will find friends, foes, and the begining of more than one journey, and I don't mean quests specifically.


	4. Welcome to Megaton!

**Hello to all my readers!**

**First off. I am very sorry that this update comes out over a year since I last updated. My only excuse for this is that for the longest time I have not been motivated to work on this. To anyone out there still reading this I sincerely apologize and I hope that this chapter goes at least a small way towards making it up to all of you.**

**I really don't have anything else to say at this point. So please enjoy the chapter.**

**Ch. 4**

**Welcome to Megaton!**

"...Ugh." Angleos grunted as he slowly woke from his slumber. "What a crazy dream, leaving the vault, raiders, super mutants, Regulators..." He trailed off when he realized he wasn't in his room inside Vault 101, but instead sitting up against the wall of a bombed out house.

He tried to get up, but stopped when he felt a weight on his left side. He turned his head to find his childhood friend Amata Almodavar holding tightly onto his left arm and using his shoulder as a pillow. He smiled seeing the serene expression on her face. It was like she didn't have a care in the world, despite all that had happened the day before.

"So it wasn't a dream," Angleos said quietly to himself.

"Not even close." Came a voice that made Angelos jump. He looked towards one of the many large holes in the wall and saw Gabriel standing there facing away from him, staring out at the desolate landscape.

"Sleep well?" Gabriel asked still facing away.

"...As well as a guy can after sleeping against a wall." Angelos said, rubbing his eyes.

"Heh, that's life in the wasteland kid, you'd best get used to it. We need to get moving, so you might want to wake her up so we can move on to Megaton." Gabriel said, pointing to Amata. He then started walking down to the slope that led to the street. "Meet me at the bottom of the slope when you're ready," he instructed.

"Right," he called after him. He leaned his head close to hers and whispered "Wake up Amata. We need to get moving now," while gently shaking her with his right arm.

Amata stirred slowly, and opened her eyes. "...Angelos? Where are we?" she asked.

"Inside the old, bombed out house that we fell asleep in. Right now we need to wake up and get to Megaton, so we can start looking for my dad," Angelos replied.

"So all that crazy stuff that happened wasn't a dream?" she asked.

"Apparently not. It all seemed like a bad dream didn't it?" he replied.

"Yeah," she said quietly.

"Anyway, Gabriel told us to get ready. We're gonna head for Megaton soon," he told her.

"Where is Gabriel anyway?" she asked, getting up and stretching.

"He's waiting for us at the bottom of the slope leading to the street," he replied, following her example and working the kinks out of his neck.

They both looked around the house and collected any belongings that were left out from the night before. Soon the two vault dwellers hiked towards the slope leading to the destroyed town.

At the bottom they found Gabriel leaning up against the rock wall, obviously waiting for them. He looked up as they descended, kicking up gravel with every step. Angelos and Amata got their first really good look at the man that saved their lives. He was a tall man measuring at about 6'2", with tanned skin bearing testament to the amount of time he spent in the sun, green eyes watching all around him for danger, underneath his cowboy style hat they could see shaggy black hair that if you looked closely at it you could see small bits of gray. All in all, he looked around 35 to 40 years old. He was currently wearing his Regulator duster. It was black and obviously customized as it seemed that the left sleeve was stitched on and came down to his wrist. On his left hand was what looked like a fingerless glove with a metal plate on the back. On the back of the duster, a design depicting a pair of angel's wings was visible.

Likewise this was the first time Gabriel got a good look at these two young adults. They were both around 19 years old. Angelos stood about 6 foot even; he had dark brown eyes that held no small amount of fear and nervousness in them. He had a bit of stubble on his chin and had dark brown almost black hair that had been slicked backwards. The skin on his face held a little bit of a tan to it, a testament to the vault artificial sun lights.

Amata had a darker skin tone than her friend, giving her an almost Hispanic look, with reddish hair tied back in a ponytail. Her green eyes were looking all around for anything that she could constitute as a threat. She stood at about 5'9" and had a lithe figure.

"I did a little bit of scouting before you got up this morning. Looks like at least 3 raiders are searching the area for you two," Gabriel said, straightening up as they approached.

"What do we do?" Angelos asked.

"You won't do anything," Gabriel said rather bluntly. "I'll go around and take care of them myself."

"We can't help you at all?" Amata asked.

"That depends...do you think you two are ready to kill another human being?," Gabriel answered. When they remained silent he said, "I thought so. You just sit tight until I take out the patrols. After that we hit Megaton." With that he turned around the walked towards the houses, he slipped inside of one and disappeared from view.

When they were sure he was out of earshot Angelos spoke, "We should follow him." he said suddenly.

"What?," said Amata whipping her head around to focus on him, "You heard what he said, we're not ready to kill another person. We should stay here where it's safe."

"I know what he said, but if we're going to learn how to survive out here then we need to observe how others do just that." Angelos replied.

They remained silent for a moment, mulling the thought around their heads.

Amata broke the silence. "Watch and learn?" she suggested with a small grin.

"Exactly, but we'll need to keep quiet and stay low so we don't attract their attention," Angelos said with a grin of his own.

The two vault dwellers nodded and began making their way around the house, crouching close to the ground when they got to a spot that gave them a good view of the street. They saw the raiders walking around talking amongst themselves. 'They sure don't look any less ugly during the day.' Angelos thought to himself. Indeed he was right, if anything they looked better during nighttime, at least then you couldn't see most of the dirt and dried blood coating their clothes or the looks on their faces that were reminiscent of wild animals.

"Look over there," Amata whispered to him, pointing at a house across the street. He complied and saw Gabriel hiding in the shadows inside one of the houses watching the raiders waiting for the right time to strike.

He didn't have to wait long. After a few minutes he had his chance when two raiders began walking towards the foothills and the third decided it would be a good idea to take piss in one of the houses...

...the same house that the Regulator was currently hiding in.

Gabriel shrunk up against the wall next to the door and waited. The raider walked on by without even realizing he would be dead in a few moments. Gabriel took a combat knife out of one the inner pockets of his duster and snuck up on his unsuspecting victim...

**Schlick!**

Without so much as a sound he brought the hand holding the knife to the front of his target's throat and in one swift move slit his throat wide open. The raider's eyes didn't even have time to widen as he fell to the ground, his blood beginning to pool beneath him.

Gabriel put the knife away and looked outside at the other two raiders. They had just stopped at the final house and were looking around for any trace of the ones that killed five of their own the night before. Gabriel chose this moment to pat himself on the back for disposing of the bodies from the night before. In reality it wasn't really disposing, so much as him dumping the bodies in a ditch behind the Red Rocket gas station after he policed them and taking anything of value. 'Crude...but effective.' he thought.

Gabriel narrowed his eyes and slowly took out his .44 Magnum. He brought the weapon up to his face, laid the barrel on his left arm and looked down the scope at his targets. He took a deep breath, closed his left eye, took aim and squeezed the trigger.

**Bang!**

One of the raiders suddenly dropped to the ground sporting a new hole in his chest. The other raider brought out his weapon, a hunting rifle, and began looking around wildly for whatever it was that killed his partner.

**Bang!**

The next shot hit him in the stomach. He doubled over in pain and dropped his rifle. Gabriel kept his weapon at the ready while he walked up to the man who was currently on the ground moaning in pain.

-With Angelos and Amata-

The two Vault dwellers were amazed with the ease that this man was able to kill another human being. They watched on and in the span of less than 30 seconds two more raiders lay dead with a third one on the ground, dying.

Through it all though, Amata was puzzled. "Why did he leave that one alive?" she asked out loud.

Angelos must have heard her because he turned to her with a quizzical look on his face. "Huh? What do you mean?" he whispered.

Amata looked at him and whispered back, "I mean why did he not kill the third one. He could have easily done so, so why... (Bang!)"

Their attention was drawn from their conversation back to the street where they saw the raider on the ground with Gabriel squatting next to him, saying something. The raider was sporting a new bullet-hole in his leg. They heard Gabriel speak again, asking the wounded man some sort of question, and it dawned on them that they were watching an interrogation.

-With Gabriel-

He knelt down next to the man and spoke "Alright you piece of shit you have information that I want. Now I am going to ask you a series of simple questions that I want answered, if you don't answer I'll put another round in your other leg. You got it?" The raider put on his best snarl and said, "Go to hell! I ain't saying shit!"

Gabriel shot back "I don't want you to say 'shit' I want you to answer my questions. If you don't I'll give you a couple more holes to match the one in your stomach, how's that?"

The man went silent, still giving him a pained glare. Gabriel continued "Alright question one: Why are you here?"

"Fuck you!" was his response.

"Wrong answer," and with that another shot rang through the air and a new hole appeared in the man's leg.

"AAARRRGGGHHH!" The man screamed. He fell over and began writhing in agony holding his leg. He didn't stop for 5 minutes, when he finally stopped Gabriel repeated his question. This time the man answered through gritted teeth, "We want to get inside Vault 101."

Gabriel narrowed his eyes at this information and spoke, "Why?"

The man looked at Gabriel and smiled and evil smile, his teeth stained from the blood bubbling up from inside his chest. "Because once we do, the tech we'll find in there will help us rule this god forsaken wasteland."

Gabriel brought his face closer to the man's. "Who is your leader and how many more of you are there in the school building," he asked.

The man groaned from the pain, but managed to answer "We still got 14 people in there including our 'leader' Cleo. She is one mean bitch; you signed your death warrant by interfering with us here. She is gonna make your life a living hell." He paused for a moment as he saw something out of the corner of his eye; it was the two vaulties that he heard about from last night. He pointed at them and continued with a sick grin on his face "...theirs too."

Gabriel's eyes widened as he looked over at the houses. Sure enough, standing there with looks of absolute horror on their faces were Angelos and Amata. They had seen everything if Gabriel guessed right, which he prayed was not the case. He closed his eyes for a moment before taking a deep breath.

*chuckle*

He turned his attention to the raider lying on the ground and found him still smiling, even beginning to laugh at either the situation, or because he was insane, Gabriel was willing to place a bet on either being the cause.

As the chuckling turned to full blown laughter, Gabriel decided he'd had enough of this man. He brought his hands up and placed them on either side of the raider's head. He pulled the man up off the ground and *snap* gave a quick but forceful twist, breaking the man's neck.

He stood up, dropping the man's corpse back on the ground, and turned his head to his two charges with a blank face and said "I really wish you hadn't seen that." He started walking down the street towards the gas station. He had barely made it ten steps when he felt someone grab his arm. Turning his head he saw that Angelos did it to make him stop. Amata was standing behind them staring at the body, fighting the bile rising up in her throat as she remembered her own brutal interrogation at the hands of her father.

"What the hell was that?" He spoke while waving an arm towards the raider lying dead on the ground, his head now twisted at an impossible angle.

"That was what was known as an 'interrogation'," Gabriel put emphasis on the word.

This only served to make Angleos even angrier. "I know what an interrogation is! What I meant was why did you kill him if he told you everything you wanted to know?"

Gabriel could only shake his head at that. 'His naiveté is astounding.' "Because out here in the wastes the golden rule is 'Kill or be killed'. If I hadn't killed him then there was a good chance he could have told his leader that someone like me was here to kill her. She would fortify herself in that school building to the point that trying to get to her would be impossible for one person like me. As it stands, right now she'll probably think that someone from Megaton wandered down here to investigate and wound up killing her men before running away."

Gabriel just stared at Angelos's face, taking note of how he turned his head away and was looking down at the ground, a sure sign of him conceding his position. Gabriel sighed "Look, you've lived down in that metal hole since you were born; you had fresh food, non-irradiated fresh water and above all, safety. You aren't used to your actions having long reaching consequences. But that was down there, up here the rules are different so you're both gonna have to play by what few we have if you want to survive."

Angelos lifted his head at these words. "How are we going to survive then? We don't know any of these 'rules' you have and we can't bring ourselves to shoot at the people who would kill us..." he stopped when he felt a hand land on his shoulder and heard Gabriel's voice, "That's why I'm here or did you forget? I'll teach you how to survive and before you know it you'll be like naturals." Gabriel said with conviction. Angelos didn't say anything but lowered his head, not in defeat but in thought.

Gabriel then turned his attention to his other charge; Amata was still rooted to her spot a couple of feet away, staring at the body. He walked over to her, and saw that her face was wet with tears. He put a hand on her shoulder and gave it a gentle shake, bringing her out of her thoughts.

"Wanna talk about it?" She shook her head and said, "I'm fine, it's just that remembering what happened down there, seeing what my father became. I just wish that I could have helped him."

"If what you told me about him is true then I don't think that would have been possible," Gabriel stated, staring at the young woman.

She turned her head sharply and looked at him with an emotion close to fury. "You don't know anything about my father so don't act like you do."

"I may not know him personally but I know his type." Gabriel said, Amata looked at him confused. "I've met people like him before. They are so accustomed to power and control that they would do anything to protect it. Your father didn't want anyone questioning his authority, so when James defied him and abandoned the vault he went mad with that power and tried to reassert his control under the guise of vault security. If what you told me happened down there is accurate then his real motive was, most likely, a display of force so frightening, that everyone else down there would never even think of going against him again."

Amata was silent as she looked at him. Gabriel shrugged, "That's just my input. You can believe whatever you want. But be warned, trying to accept a lie as the truth has unpleasant consequences when the real truth becomes undeniable." With that he began walking towards the Red Rocket gas station once more. After a couple of feet he stopped and said over his shoulder, "We should get moving, Megaton is only a few minutes up the road in the foothills and the sooner we get there the sooner we can start trying to find your dad." He started walking again

The two vault dwellers stared after him for a moment, then at each other before following the man into the hills towards the metal structure in the distance that was Megaton.

They had just passed the second sign pointing north to Megaton, and were nearing pools of what looked like radioactive waste when Gabriel stopped suddenly.

"What's wro-(shhhh!)" Gabriel quickly shushed Amata's inquiry as he tilted his head from side to side, his eyes closed as if he was thinking, "Do you hear it?" The question caught Angelos and Amata by surprise as they couldn't hear anything but the wind blowing.

Then they heard it...

(gghhhhhkkkttt)

The noise echoed around them, bouncing off the rocks.

"Shit." Gabriel yelled as he turned towards the other two. "Listen up. This is going to be your first test in surviving the wasteland, get your pistols out. Angelos you keep a lookout over near direction of the sign, Amata look around near the waste pools, and I'll keep an eye near Megaton."

"What is going on?" Angelos yelled as he and Amata drew their pistols from their holsters, but he didn't get a reply because at that moment the source of the noise made itself known. The biggest ant Angelos had ever seen scuttled its way into the open from behind a large rock on his right. It had to be almost 3 feet in length, its black mandibles like knives as they were brandished towards the group.

"...Giant Ants," was all Gabriel said before he squeezed the trigger of his trusty .44 Magnum. The ant fell to the ground, greenish blood pooling beneath it from the giant hole in its head.

The other two could only stare at the scene. Pistols still in hand, they walked over and examined the corpse of the giant insect. "Holy shit, is this what radiation is capable of?" Angelos asked no one in particular.

His musing was interrupted as another (gghhhhkkkkttt) came from their right. Another ant made its way around the same rock and began clicking it's mandibles menacingly at them. The two jumped backwards just in time to avoid getting a limb bitten off. They staggered back towards Gabriel who yelled "Shoot it!"

Angelos didn't need to be told twice; he raised his gun and aimed in between the thing's eyes. He pulled the trigger and a loud *bang* rang in his ears. The ant reared back from the shot but didn't go down. He pulled the trigger again and watched as the monstrosity's legs fell out from under it and lay still.

Gabriel walked over and inspected the corpses as if to make sure they were still dead. When he was satisfied that some unknown qualification was met he turned around and Angelos saw him nod his head in his direction.

"What?" asked Angelos; convinced he had missed out on some joke.

"Not bad for a newbie," Gabriel said "I thought for sure you would freeze up and I would have to step in."

Angelos shook his head, "It wasn't really all that tough, and I used to help take care of radroaches around the vault when I was little. The principle is pretty much the same, just a bigger bug."

Gabriel nodded. "Let's get moving, I think we've had just about enough of the wasteland for today. We'll head up to Megaton and rest up a bit before looking around for clues about your dad."

The other two nodded and walked up to the big metal wall that separated them from the town. The powered down protectron from last night was up and running now and greeted them when they got close. "Welcome to Megaton, partners. Please enjoy your stay." It said in its flat metallic voice.

"How do we get in?" Amata queried as they stood in front of the gate.

"Like this," Gabriel said. He looked upwards and shouted "HEY STOCKHOLM! OPEN THE DAMN GATE WILL YA!"

A moment passed and then the giant turbine engine above the door began spinning. The metal wall in front of them split apart to reveal a second door on the other side of a small entrance way. The group of three walked forward, the gate to the wasteland closing behind them and the gate into Megaton opening in front of them.

Angelos's first impression of the town wasn't much. A bunch of ramshackle buildings made up of scrap metal and pieces of wood. Looking around he saw that the town was actually built inside of a depression of sorts, with more buildings around the bottom area near a pool of filthy looking water, inside of which rested...

"A nuclear bomb!" was Angelos's reaction to finding out the town had been built inside the crater of an unexploded bomb.

"Yep. The people who built Megaton decided to use this crater to protect them from the harsh winds outside, the metal, from what I've heard, came from an old airfield somewhere out in the wasteland. The town just kinda took shape after that." Explained Gabriel.

"But...the bomb...?" Amata could only stutter at the danger of such a location.

"Relax something about this particular bomb kept it from exploding on impact. It just sits there now not doing anything." Gabriel's reassurance didn't help much.

Before anyone could say anything further a deep voice rang out that was directed at them. "Well would you look at that, Gabriel Raves come for a visit, and you brought some friends with you!"

The speaker was a black man dressed in the same duster and hat as Gabriel, except his duster was brown and had both sleeves cut short. He had a short, thick beard and a deep voice that had an air of authority to it, matched by a badge on his chest that had the word 'sheriff' stamped on it. He had a smile on his face as he walked over to them

Out of the three of them, Gabriel was the first one to respond. "How's it going Lucas? It's been a while." he said while holding out his hand in greeting.

Lucas turned his attention to Gabriel, shook his hand and smiled "I've been doing well thanks. How about you?"

Gabriel shrugged his shoulders, "I can't complain. Take a look at what I found..." he pointed at Angelos and Amata. "Two vaulties, fresh out of the 101."

Amata stepped forward and extended her hand "It's nice to meet you sir, my name's Amata"

Angelos did the same "And I'm Angelos."

Lucas nodded, a smile still on his face as he shook their hands "Friendly AND well-mannered I think we'll get along just fine. Any friends of Gabriel's are friends of mine. Names Lucas Simms: town sheriff, and mayor too when the need arises. If you have any questions you be sure to come ask me."

"Now that you mention it..." Gabriel said "These two didn't just pop out of the vault of no reason. They're looking for Angelos's father; he left the vault before them. Couldn't have been more than a day or two ago."

"He's an older guy, around 50, with gray hair. Probably wearing a Vault 101 jumpsuit with a lab coat?"

Angelos elaborated.

Lucas's smile disappeared and he sighed "Sorry kid, I see a lot of people pass through here every day. I can't be troubled to remember one specific person."

Angelos's face fell "Oh, all right then. Is there anyone else in town we can ask?"

Lucas gave the question some thought. "Try Moriarty's Saloon up on the top level of the crater. He gets a lot of people in there. Just be careful, Moriarty is NOT your friend so don't expect him to just help for free and for god's sake DON'T trust him."

"I'll watch my back, thanks." Angelos replied, he started to walk off until he heard Gabriel called him back.

"Hold on kid, before we get to that let me take you two on a tour of the town. It's always a good idea to get a good look around the towns you visit before doing anything else." Gabriel told him. Angelos nodded and Gabriel turned his attention back to Lucas, "Let me take these two around town and help 'em learn the ropes, after that meet me at the Brass Lantern for a drink."

Lucas smiled again "Sounds good. I'll meet you there after I'm done with patrol." When he finished he walked down into the crater leaving the group of three by themselves.

Angelos turned to Gabriel. "Friend of yours?" he inquired.

Gabriel chuckled, and began walking off into the crater beckoning the other two to follow him. "Old friends actually. Lucas used to be a member of the Regulators, but quit a few years ago when his wife died, leaving him and his son Harden alone. He quit so he could raise Harden here, where he at least had some measure of safety." he finished on a somber tone as he walked up to a shack at the bottom of the crater with a sign next to the door that read 'Clinic'.

"That's...so sad." Amata said sympathy filling her voice.

"Yes it is. Anyway..." Gabriel shook his head to get back on track. "...this is Megaton's Clinic. It's run by Doctor Church, he's a gruff codger who hates being bothered unless it's an emergency." he said as he opened the door.

"Then why are we going inside?" Angelos asked, curious.

"Because it's fun to rile him up." Gabriel said with mirth in his voice as he walked inside. The two vault dwellers could only stare, unsure of what to say in response. They too followed after a minute of confused silence

They found themselves in a small waiting room with a desk to their immediate right, a small room filled with beds to their front, for recovering patients was Angelos's guess, and an operating room to their right. Gabriel walked through the operating room to the office beyond it where an aging black man sat in front of a computer who they guessed was Dr. Church. He beckoned them to come in and turned to the doctor before speaking. "How's business doc?"

The man sighed a moment before, turning to his visitors and replying. "I sure hope you have cancer, because if you don't you're breaking rule number 1." He turned to Gabriel with a frown on his face.

"Sorry, no serious ailments today. I'm just showing a couple of newcomers around." Gabriel said with a smile on his face.

Angelos and Amata stepped forward and started to introduce themselves. "Hello our names are..."

"I don't care"

They stopped as they were interrupted by the good doctor. He continued. "Look I don't care who you are. I've got just 2 rules around here: Rule 1. Don't bother me. Rule 2: If you do bother me, you better be damn near dead. Now then, since none of you look seriously injured I'm going to have to ask you to leave."

He ushered them back out the door into the street and unceremoniously slammed the door behind them.

"What a cheery guy." Angelos remarked.

Gabriel just chuckled. "He's pretty gruff, but he's good at what he does and he doesn't take shit from anyone, and I respect him for that. He also helped patch me up after some of my more dangerous assignments."

"You'd think he could be a bit nicer though." Amata said.

Gabriel sighed and a more serious edge came to his voice. "Look, Doc Church has had a not so pleasant past, don't ever try and talk to him about it, and his attitude now is the attitude he adopted back then. He prefers it if people just go in, get treatment, and get out. Just deal with it and everyone will be happy, alright?"

Amata spoke up. "Then why did we just do that?" She said while pointing back at the clinic.

Gabriel sighed and looked at them. "He's helped heal up more than single bullet wound on my person after a mission went south. I guess you could say that I'm in there so often that he begrudgingly accepts me as a friend...that and I'm the source of a lot of business for him so he really can't afford to be too rude."

They nodded and he gestured to a walkway to the right of the clinic. "Okay, now c'mon we're headed to the town's store next."

They nodded, and Gabriel began walking up the walkway and came to a building almost directly above the clinic. The words on the side of the building read: Craterside Supply. Gabriel walked up to the door and was about to turn the handle, but stopped and turned around to speak. "This is Craterside Supply the, uh, general store of Megaton. If you want to buy something, from guns to supplies to just about anything else, this is where you come to. The shopkeeper's name is Moira Brown, she's a little on the eccentric side, but she's a good person, and trustworthy as well. You can always expect to not be cheated here."

With that he opened the door and ushered them inside. It definitely looked the part of a general store, to their immediate left was a counter cluttered with various odds and ends. Behind it were rows of shelves loaded down with food packages, weapons, ammo, and medical supplies. Angelos looked around and saw that just about every wall of the shop had all sorts of objects and knick-knacks, with a few posters and pictures thrown in. He also noted a distinctly unfriendly looking man with an assault rifle strapped to his back leaning up against the wall next to a door that probably led to the proprietor's living area.

"Oh, hello there!" A high female voice sounded out from behind the counter.

Directing their attention to the speaker and found a red-headed woman in a light blue jumpsuit. She had her hair done up in a ponytail and a warm smile on her face. Her eyes flitted between the three until they came to rest on Gabriel.

"Oh! Gabriel, haven't seen you for awhile. How are you?" She said sweetly.

Gabriel stepped forward. "I'm doing alright Moira, and actually, I brought you a gift." He said while reaching into one of the pockets of his duster. When he brought it out again Angelos and Amata jumped back in surprise when they saw him gripping a land mine. "Oh relax, it's disarmed!" Gabriel told them. They relaxed and Gabriel turned back to Moira with a grin, "Merry Christmas Moira. Hope you like explosives."

"Oh, my very own landmine, how thoughtful! Thank you!" She squealed as she took the device from him and began looking it over, taking in every detail from the red light on top to the serial number stamped on the bottom. "So what did you find out about land mines and Minefield in general?" she queried, pulling out a notepad and pencil.

"Weeelllll, I learned that a sniper has taken up residence there taking potshots at anyone who comes too close. So if anyone plans on scaving' near there they'd have to have really fast reflexes and faster hands, because they'd have to disarm the landmines while dodging sniper fire." He explained.

Moira nodded taking notes the whole time, "Okay, so quick reflexes are essential to the successful disarming of land mines. Got it! Thanks for all your help," she said, completely ignoring the remark about the sniper. She reached down behind the counter and brought out 10 frag grenades, 10 stimpaks, and what looked like a set of incomplete blueprints. She pushed the items to him "Consider this my thanks to you for your help."

He took the items and stored them in his duster. With a tip of his hat, "Much obliged Moira." He turned his attention to Angelos and Amata and snapped his fingers when he realized they hadn't been introduced yet. "Ah, I'm sorry I forgot about introductions. Moira this is Amata and Angelos. They're vault dwellers I found up in Springvale last night. Angelos is looking for his dad, who left Vault 101 about a day or so ago."

The second Moira heard that these two young adults in front of her were from Vault 101 her face lit up in childish glee, it was like she was a little kid on her birthday. She rushed around the counter and started looking them up and down, all the while asking questions like: 'What exactly is it like down in the Vault? What do you do for fun? How many people are down there still?'

This continued for about 5 minutes, neither vault dweller having the opportunity to answer a question before a new one was presented. Luckily, Gabriel chose that moment to pull Moira away from the uncomfortable teenagers. Before she could start again with her questions Gabriel spoke, "Sorry about that. You see Moira is currently trying to complete a guide to Wasteland life, it's a passion of hers hence her exuberant behavior."

He was about to continue, most likely explaining more about the book in general, when Moira cut him off by stepping forward and extending her hand in greeting, which was promptly shook by the two. "Hello there, I'm sorry about before I just get excited when a new research opportunity presents itself. My name is Moira Brown and while I run Craterside Supply, but my real calling is in tinkering and research. Currently, I'm compiling a book detailing life in the wasteland and it'd be great if I could have the foreword done by an actual vault dweller. What do you say?"

Angelos and Amata looked at each other for a second, and then shrugged. "Sure, why not. It is for a good cause. I'm sure we can help you." Amata stated.

Moira smiled and brought out her notepad and pen once more. "Great! First off what is it like to live underground all your life?"

Angelos thought for a minute before replying. "Well, for one thing, living down there was a much simpler life than out here. Down there we don't have many worries, and the food and water was always clean. It was a great place to live until my dad left and we followed him. We didn't know what we were getting ourselves into when we stepped outside Vault 101. Right now we can already tell it's going to be tough adjusting to life out here in the Capital Wasteland." Angelos answered, with a morose tone.

"A runaway dad huh? Well, I've seen quite a few of them, but I'm afraid that I haven't seen one that had a big 101 on his back." Moira replied in a neutral tone, while writing down her notes.

Angleos's face fell at her words, his shoulders slumped. Amata, trying to comfort her friend, put a hand on his shoulder in a calming gesture.

Moira, sensing a shift in the mood, looked up from her notes and frowned. She was a very kind-hearted person and seeing someone so down over his situation didn't sit well with her. This feeling was amplified by the fact that she was the one who gave him the bad news right after they helped her so, in her mind, she needed to make it right somehow. 'Maybe I could give them something that could help them out there?' she thought. She put a finger to her chin and began thinking. She went over what she knew so far: One, these two young adults were looking for the boy's lost father. Two, they were relatively new to the waste..."EUREKA!"

Moira's sudden shout made the other three jump. Amata was the first to respond "Eureka, what?" she asked.

Moira ignored her and rushed over to a block of lockers. She opened the top right door and pulled out two objects. She brought them over to the group and held them up revealing two Vault 101 jumpsuits, but these were different than the jumpsuits they normally saw. These jumpsuits had obviously been modified; they possessed armored plates, along with a multitude of holsters located on the back for larger weapons, and on the sides of the legs for pistols and other small arms. To accompany the holsters were multiple bags attached to a belt on the waist and a strap going from the left shoulders to the opposite waists, the strap, bags, and belt seemed to have been modified with additional leather slots to hold a variety of items, though Angelos suspected the primary use was to hold ammo. All in all, they were better equipped for wasteland life than Amata's normal 101 jumpsuit, or even Angelos's 101 security armor.

"Here, these belonged to a couple of vault dwellers that came by a few years back. They said they were going to scout the wasteland and I volunteered to give their suits a bit more protection. But before I could give these to them they were called back to Vault 101 and we never heard from them again." She explained, handing them the jumpsuits. "Consider this my way of saying thank you for the foreword and my way of saying good luck to finding your father."

The two vault-dwellers were speechless at her generosity. "Thank you so much, this very generous of you. But shouldn't we pay for these or something? I mean we really didn't do much besides answer a question." Angleos asked, oblivious to Gabriel slapping his forehead behind him.

"Oh, no. This is my way of thanking you for that valuable information. Vault Dwellers are like diamonds up here so actually getting to talk to not one, but two in the same day is a spectacular opportunity, well worth a couple of jumpsuits. Plus, it's unlikely that either of you have enough caps to cover the full cost of both jumpsuits anyway." She reassured him.

Angelos nodded, accepting her words until something she said clicked in his mind. "Caps?" he said confused.

"Hm?" Moira questioned.

"You said that we didn't have enough caps to pay for the jumpsuits. What do you mean by 'caps'?" Angelos asked putting emphasis on the word caps.

Moira had a confused look on her face before she remembered who she was talking to. "Oh! I guess Gabriel forgot to tell you. 'Caps' is short for Nuka-Cola bottle caps..." she said digging around in the pockets of her jumpsuit before producing one of the bottle caps in question and showing it to them, "After the bombs dropped and the governments disappeared modern currency, like dollars, was no longer a valid method of exchange. So we up here in the wastes adopted a more solid form of currency in the form of...bottle caps!" Moira smiled the opportunity to share some history with the new wastelanders.

Angelos and Amata just stood there. "...Bottle caps?" Amata asked, not quite understanding. Moira nodded affirmative.

"Seriously?" Another nod.

"It could have been worse, you know." Gabriel stated.

"How exactly could things be worse than not having a real form of currency?" Amata asked accusingly.

"It's not all bad. Caps only come in one form and though that makes it tricky sometimes when large purchases are made they have a constant value. There is also no inflation, since new bottle caps are only found not made. They are also reasonably easy to find making getting by pretty simple for a capable wastelander. All in all bottle caps are a very stable, abundant form of currency" Gabriel explained.

Amata nodded her head in understanding. "Okay, I guess that makes sense." She looked at the jumpsuit in her arms. "Is there somewhere we can try these on?" She asked.

Moira thought for a second. "Sure, just follow me." She walked through the door on the side of the shop, beckoning Amata to follow her. The young woman complied, and Moira shut the door behind her, giving the young woman some privacy.

A few minutes later, she emerged sporting her new armored jumpsuit. Angelos noted that, oddly enough, it seemed to fit her perfectly. It accentuated the growing woman's curves, while at the same time making her look ready to take on whatever was out there in that post-apocalyptic hell. 'Where did that come from?' He thought as she came over to him and Gabriel.

"Soooo, how do I look?" She asked, putting a hand on her hip trying to look tough.

Gabriel sighed and shook his head "It's not about looks out here. What matters is that your clothing has the ability to protect you when things get rough. Although, as far as apparel goes you could do a hell of a lot worse."

She 'hmphed' at his words before turning to Angelos, who was still staring at her. She shifted a bit under his stare before snapping her fingers a couple of times in front of his face to snap him out of it. He shook his head and blinked. "Soooooo...?" She drawled. Feeling bold he gave a wolf wistle "You...look great." He said smiling.

She smiled back while sporting a blush. "Now it's your turn." she stated. He nodded and went into the living area, shutting the door behind himself. A few minutes later he too emerged dressed in his new armored vault suit. This time it was Amata who found herself staring.

Crossing his arms, left boot forward and right at a right angle, he put on what he thought was serious expression: head cocked to his right, and a small troublemaker's smile on his face. "Well…?" Angelos asked, staring Amata straight into her emerald eyes. Across her cheeks and the bridge of her nose she felt her face heat up. 'The new suit fit him well…very well.' She thought to herself, which made her face a dozen degrees warmer she thought. She nodded, not having faith in her mouth to formulate an answer that wouldn't embarrass her.

"You two wait outside. I've still have a little business to take care of with Moira." Gabriel said.

The two nodded and walked out. As soon as the door shut behind them Gabriel turned back to Moira with a serious expression. "What's the word from the caravans?"

Moira put a finger to her chin in thought, "Oh well, let's see...I did hear about some raiders making trouble up in Arefu, and there have been some disappearances around Andale. Some of the Wastelanders around that area went missing and they haven't turned up. That's about all...oh, and that nice old lady Agatha, played a song over the radio to thank you for finding her a new violin. Aren't you sweet!" She smiled at the last part.

Gabriel too, smiled, he remembered the nice old woman very well. About a week ago he stumbled across an old cabin hidden with a very powerful radio relay inside of a small cliff. Upon closer investigation he met Agatha, a violinist whose songs were played over the radio on the caravans at night while they were on the trails. He knew she was quite talented, having listened to her station himself at times. She told him about how her husband created the radio station and how it spanned the entire Capital Wasteland, and about how she longed for a proper violin to replace her handmade one. At her request, he ventured to Vault 92, where some of the U.S.'s top musical talent were housed, fought through all manner of horrid creatures, and located what was quite possibly the last real violin in the world, the Soil Stradivarius. He returned it safely to her and received a modest cap reward as well as a special .44 Magnum named Blackhawk for giving her the sheet of music paper he found with the violin.

"Raiders and disappearances, huh? Sounds like its right up my alley." Gabriel had a smirk on his face as he said these words. "Before I forget, would you be willing to 'donate' some equipment for about a week?"

Moira looked at him confused. "What do you need?"

Gabriel took a piece of paper and a pencil from the counter and began to write. A few minutes later he handed the completed list to Moira. She read it over, when she finished she looked up at him with a raised eyebrow, "This is quite a bit of stuff you're asking for. You sure you can pay for it all?"

"I'm not buying all of it! I'm just renting for now. Do you have everything on the list on hand or will you need me to scav some items?" Gabriel responded.

Moira took another look at the list. "Mm-hm...I do have everything you're asking for, but can you afford it?"

Gabriel reached into the folds of his duster and brought out a good-sized, clinking bag. "This should be enough to cover all that I need. Can you have it all ready by tomorrow morning?"

Moira smiled and took the bag, weighing it in her hand. "I'll have it ready and waiting for you by then. Although I have to ask: What do you need all of this for? You're not planning anything dangerous are you?"

Gabriel laughed at the accusation. "What isn't dangerous nowadays? But in all seriousness what I need this for is...a learning exercise." He said cryptically

He stood up, bid Moira farewell and walked out, a grin on his face the whole time.

He walked outside and spoke to his charges. "Up there…" He pointed at a building that was perched highest up out of any building in the crater. "…Is Moriarty's saloon. If there's anyone in town that can tell us about your dad it'll be him. Let me do the talking, Moriarty's a wily bastard and isn't afraid to exploit someone if he has something they want. Don't try to threaten anyone, and make sure to keep all of your weapons secure in their holsters. The people up there not only are people who live up here but they will also most likely be drunk, so watch your step."

Angelos and Amata nodded and Gabriel began leading them towards the Saloon. "Now there are a couple of things you should know before we walk inside…" He said as they began walking up the side of the crater on a set of improvised steps. "…first thing: do NOT freak out at the sight of the barman."

"Why would we freak out?" Angelos questioned.

"Because the barman, Gob, has suffered an unfortunate side effect to incredibly high radiation exposure. He has no skin and little hair to speak of and doesn't appreciate people pointing that particular fact out." Gabriel explained before continuing with his warning. "Second: This is a bar we are walking into. There is no legal drinking age out here, and since you two are technically adults you can order beer, whiskey, or whatever else strikes your fancy. If you do, don't overdo it because I will not drag your asses out of there if you do get drunk."

"Duly noted." Amata said halfheartedly as they walked up to the front door of the saloon and stopped. "Anything else?" She asked.

"Yes actually. Try to keep a low profile, by that I mean don't let on that you two just came out of the Vault yesterday. Some of the people in here aren't above taking advantage of the ignorant." And with his warning complete he pushed open the door and led them inside the dimly lit bar.

Gabriel looked around the main room and breathed a small sigh of relief seeing its relative emptiness. Despite the fact that the Old World was long gone, most people still adhered to some of its customs and waited until late in the day to get hammered, a fact he exploited. It wasn't perfect though as he could see that two or three Megaton inhabitants had still chosen to drown their troubles in a bottle of poorly brewed alcohol. Thankfully these patrons were well on their way to being drunk and hopefully wouldn't bother them, and if they did their inebriation would ensure they wouldn't remember anything.

He walked up to the counter and took a seat with Angelos and Amata taking up their own seats to his right. "Hey Gob! Where are ya?" Gabriel called out.

"I'm down here." A raspy, guttural voice emanated from behind the counter. A moment later the voice's owner appeared from behind the counter, causing both Angelos and Amata to visibly recoil with looks of revulsion on their faces.

The man in question looked like something out of a horror movie. He was dressed in a simple faded brown t-shirt and cargo pants, the portions of the man's flesh that were visible had little to no skin covering the muscle tissue. If that weren't bad enough what skin he did have was a faded yellowish color. His eyes were a milky blue and his head was barely kept from being bald by sparse patches of hair.

He looked at the two vault dwellers with annoyance. "What, you two never seen a ghoul before?" He snapped before looking at who they were sitting next to. "Oh hey Gabriel! These two with you?" He jerked his head in their direction.

Gabirel nodded his head. "Cut 'em some slack Gob they just crawled out of Vault 101 yesterday. Never even seen a ghoul before. You probably surprised them." He said with mirth.

Amata, who looked like a little less green by this time, chose this moment to speak up. "I'm sorry about that sir. It's just that we've never seen someone as…'unique' looking as you."

Gob's eyes widened at her polite tone. "You mean…you're not going to freak out, run or even berate me a little bit?" He said, surprised.

Amata cocked her head in confusion. She looked at Angelos, who shared in her confusion. Angelos spoke first. "We would never do something like that. What would make you think that we would?"

Gob huffed. "Ah, I get more than enough asshole smoothskins in here that treat me like shit because I look like a walking corpse."

Angelos cocked an eyebrow. "Smoothskins?"

Gob laughed which coming from sound more like a stuttering growl. "People like me, people exposed to large levels of radiation that lived, are called ghouls and zombies by the bigots of the world. So we took to calling you 'smoothskins' in return. I'll tell ya what, you two seem alright. Moriarty would kill me if he caught me giving a discount to anyone but for you two newcomers I'll risk it." He whispered.

Both Angelos and Amata were taken aback at the show of kindness. "Why would you do that for us?" Amata questioned.

"Three reasons: One, I hate Moriarty and this is my way of getting back at him for keeping me here until I pay the debt I owe him. Two, you two are some of the nicer people I've met here and people like you need friends. Three, you know Gabriel and anyone that Gabriel says is alright is aces in my book." Gob replied with a small smile. "So, now that we've got that taken care of. What can I get you?"

"Actually we're here on business. Where's Moriarty?" Gabriel interjected.

Gob jerked a thumb upwards. "Still asleep upstairs. You wanna go wake him up go ahead. I'm enjoying the peace and quiet too much."

Gabriel groaned and rolled his eyes; he got up from the barstool and made his way upstairs to the door of Moriarty's room. Once there he raised his fist and looked down at his audience of two humans and one ghoul. Upon seeing them snickering at what was about to happen he banged his fist on the door…three times…LOUDLY. "Wake up Moriarty! We gotta talk!" He all but yelled.

For a moment there was silence before a muffled reply came from beyond the door. "You just got no fucking patience do you Gabriel. Waking a hardworking businessman at this ungodly hour."

The door opened revealing a bearded man in his late 50s. His grayish, almost white, hair looked hastily brushed back and he was wearing a leather vest over a white t-shirt, army boots, and heavily stitched pants.

He turned and glared at Gabriel who reciprocated the gesture. "Well…I'm here. What the hell is so important that it couldn't wait 'till I got up of my own accord" Moriarty growled, his voice carrying a distinct Irish accent.

"I'm here for one thing and one thing only. Information." Gabriel replied with no small amount of distaste in his words.

Moriarty smirked. "Oh, so the mighty Regulator needs the help of a humble bar owner like myself." He mocked.

Gabriel's glare intensified for split second before he snorted. "What's it gonna take?"

Moriarty's smirk dropped and his voice became serious. "Well now that depends on what you're looking for."

Gabriel jerked his head in the direction of Angelos and Amata downstairs. "Long story short. See those kids down there. Just came out of Vault 101 yesterday chasing the boy's dad. The dad's name was James and it's incredibly likely he came through Megaton. You know anything?"

Moriarty's reaction surprised them. As soon as Gabriel had mentioned the name 'James' his eyes widened a fraction and he turned his gaze to Angelos. After getting a good look at him Moriarty's eyes widened further. "What's your name boy?" He asked.

"Angelos" Was his reply.

Moriarty frowned. "Your last name boyo." He specified.

Angelos raised an eyebrow in confusion but complied nonetheless. "Lawson. Angelos Lawson."

Upon hearing this Moriarty actually chuckled. "Well I'll be. The little baby is all grown up."

Moriarty fell silent and stared at Angelos until the sound of Gabriel snapping his fingers in front of his face brought him back to reality. "Don't go senile on me yet Moriarty. Do you know something about his dad or what?"

Moriarty chuckled again. "Aye, I do. I've met your dad on more than one occasion, and I've met that boy down there once before as well."

Angelos and Amata looked confused at his words while Gabriel just snorted. "Do us all a favor and don't try to BS us Colin. We came here because we thought you knew something, if this is all you've got we're better off looking somewhere else." With that said he turned to walk away.

Moriarty just continued smiling. "You would be hard pressed to find anyone else that knows exactly where James Lawson is going. Of that I can assure you."

"How do you know my dad's name?" Moriarty turned his head towards Angelos.

"Well now, I know because I first met him almost nineteen years ago when he came by looking to get inside that Vault. He, his Brotherhood of Steel friend…"

His next words chilled the young man to the bone.

"…and his newborn son."

-End Chapter-

**Well, be honest, who here already knew that was coming? **

**Anywho, I don't have anything worth saying here except for yet another apology from me to my readers. I am very sorry this took so long.**

**I would also like to thank my excellent betas: Tutor Verum, snipa, and Kokirlink.**

**Next time: The Power of the Atom!**


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